Report to Congressional Requesters

United States General Accounting Office 

GAO 

June 2003 TRANSPORTATIONDISADVANTAGED 

POPULATIONS 

Some Coordination 

Efforts Among 

Programs Providing 

Transportation 

Services, but 

Obstacles Persist 

GAO-03-697 
Sixty-two federal programs—most of which are administered by the 

Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, Education, and 

Transportation—fund transportation services for the transportationdisadvantaged. The full amount these programs spend on transportation is 

unknown because transportation is not always tracked separately from other 

spending. However, available information (i.e., estimated or actual outlays or 

obligations) on 29 of the programs shows that federal agencies spent at least 

an estimated $2.4 billion on these services in fiscal year 2001. Additional 

spending by states and localities is also not fully known but is at least in the 

hundreds of millions of dollars. 

Efforts to improve services and achieve cost savings through coordination of 

transportation activities (through sharing resources or information or 

consolidating services under a single agency) among federal agencies vary. 

The Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility—a body with 

representation from the Departments of Transportation and Health and 

Human Services—has undertaken some activities to improve coordination. 

However, other agencies that administer a substantial number of programs 

for the transportation-disadvantaged, such as the Departments of Labor and 

Education, are not part of the Council. In addition, the Coordinating 

Council’s strategic plan is not linked to its action plan and contains few 

measurable performance goals. The strategic and annual performance plans 

of the Departments of Transportation and Health and Human Services 

contain few references to coordination relating to their subagencies and 

programs that fund transportation services for the transportationdisadvantaged, and the plans of the Departments of Labor and Education do 

not mention coordinating these services. 

Obstacles impeding coordination include concern among administrators that 

their own participants might be negatively affected, program rules that limit 

use by others, and limited guidance and information on coordination. To 

mitigate these obstacles, officials and experts suggested making federal 

standards more consistent, creating a clearinghouse or better Web site to 

facilitate interagency communication and provide better guidance on 

coordination, and providing financial incentives or instituting mandates to 

coordinate. 

Examples of Vehicles Used to Serve the Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Millions of Americans are unable to 

provide their own transportation—

or even use public transportation—

for Medicaid appointments, Head 

Start classes, job training, or other 

services. Such “transportationdisadvantaged” persons are often 

disabled, elderly, or low income. 

Various federal programs are 

authorized to provide 

transportation services to them. 

GAO was asked to (1) identify the 

federal programs that fund such 

transportation services and the 

amount spent on them, (2) assess 

the extent of coordination among 

the various programs, and (3) 

identify any obstacles to 

coordination and potential ways to 

overcome such obstacles. 

GAO recommends that the 

Departments of Labor and 

Education join the Coordinating 

Council on Access and Mobility. 

GAO also recommends that the 

Departments of Health and Human 

Services, Labor, Education, and 

Transportation (1) strengthen the 

Coordinating Council’s strategic 

plan, (2) include long-term goals 

and measures for coordination in 

their agencies’ strategic and annual 

performance plans, and (3) develop 

and distribute additional guidance 

and information to encourage 

coordination. 

The Departments of Health and 

Human Services, Labor, Education, 

and Transportation generally 

concurred with the findings and 

recommendations in this report. 

www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-03-697.

To view the full product, including the scope 

and methodology, click on the link above. 

For more information, contact. Katherine 

Siggerud at (202) 512-2834. 

Highlights of GAO-03-697, a report to 

congressional requesters 

June 2003

TRANSPORTATION-DISADVANTAGED 

POPULATIONS 

Some Coordination Efforts Among 

Programs Providing Transportation 

Services, but Obstacles Persist
Page i GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Letter 1

Results in Brief 3

Background 6

Sixty-Two Federal Programs Fund Transportation Services to 

Transportation-Disadvantaged Populations 8

Extent of Spending on Services for the TransportationDisadvantaged Is Not Fully Known but Is in the Billions of 

Dollars 12

Coordination Efforts Vary, but Some Successful Efforts Show 

Promising Results 17

Officials Cited Numerous Obstacles to Successfully Coordinating 

Services and Provided Potential Options to Mitigate Them 28

Conclusions 36

Recommendations for Executive Action 37

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation 38

Appendix I Scope and Methodology 40 

Appendix II Inventory of Federal Programs Providing 

Transportation Services to the TransportationDisadvantaged 42 

Appendix III Federal and State Coordination Efforts 55 

Federal Coordination 55

State Coordination 60

Appendix IV Informational Resources on Coordination 62 

Web Sites 62

Reports 62

Appendix V Comments from the Department of Health and 

Human Services 63 

GAO Comments 66

Contents 
Page ii GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Appendix VI Comments from the Department of Education 67 

Appendix VII GAO Contacts and Staff Acknowledgments 69 

GAO Contacts 69

Staff Acknowledgments 69

Tables 

Table 1: Sixteen Programs Identified by CTAA as Regularly 

Providing Funding for Transportation 10

Table 2: Eleven Programs Spending at Least $4 Million in Fiscal 

Year 2001 11

Table 3: Estimated Spending on Transportation Services for the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged by Eight Federal Agencies 

in Fiscal Year 2001 13

Table 4: Status of Federal Responses to GAO’s Recommendations 

to Improve Coordination 23

Table 5: Federal Actions Taken in Response to GAO 

Recommendations for Improving Coordination 55

Table 6: Examples of State Coordination of Services for the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 60

Figures 

Figure 1: Number of Programs Providing Transportation Services 

to the Transportation-Disadvantaged, by Agency 9

Figure 2: Overlapping Daily Routes of Vehicles Serving the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged in Sioux Falls, South 

Dakota 21
Page iii GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Abbreviations 

ADA Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 

CTAA Community Transportation Association of America 

CTAP Community Transportation Assistance Project 

DOL U.S. Department of Labor 

DOT U.S. Department of Transportation 

FTA Federal Transit Administration 

GPRA Government Performance and Results Act of 1993 

HHS U.S. Department of Health and Human Services 

HUD U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development 

JARC Job Access and Reverse Commute 

MOE maintenance of effort 

P.L. public law 

RTAP Rural Transit Assistance Program 

TANF Temporary Assistance for Needy Families 

TEA-21 Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century 

TCRP Transit Cooperative Research Program 

U.S.C. U.S. Code 

VA U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs 

VR Vocational Rehabilitation 

WETAP Wisconsin Employment Transportation Assistance Program 

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Page 1 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

June 30, 2003 

The Honorable Don Young 

Chairman 

The Honorable James L. Oberstar 

Ranking Democratic Member 

Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure 

House of Representatives 

The Honorable Thomas E. Petri 

Chairman 

The Honorable William O. Lipinski 

Ranking Democratic Member 

Subcommittee on Highways, Transit, and Pipelines 

Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure 

House of Representatives 

The ability to access personal or public transportation is fundamental for 

people to connect with employment opportunities, health and medical 

services, educational services, and the community at large. However, 

certain populations in the United States lack the ability to provide their 

own transportation or have difficulty accessing whatever conventional 

public transportation may be available. These “transportationdisadvantaged” persons may have an age-related condition, a disability, or 

income constraints. This is potentially a sizeable group. For example, 

according to the 2000 U.S. Census, 35.1 million people were over age 65, 

44.5 million people were over age 21 and disabled, and 33.9 million people 

were living below the poverty line. Many within these populations face 

significant problems in accessing transportation. 

Many federal programs authorize use of funds to provide transportation 

for transportation-disadvantaged people so they can access government 

programs. Programs that provide incidental transportation include health 

and medical programs, job-training programs, or programs for the aging. 

The coordination of these transportation services—through pooling 

resources, consolidating trips provided by various agencies under a single 

agency, or sharing information between programs—has been found to 

improve the quality and cost-effectiveness of service. At the federal level, 

the Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility—a body consisting of 

representatives from the Departments of Health and Human Services and 

Transportation—is charged with coordinating transportation services 

provided by federal programs and promoting the maximum feasible 

United States General Accounting Office

Washington, DC 20548 
Page 2 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

coordination at the state and local levels. In a 1999 report,1 we found that 

these coordination efforts needed strengthening. We have also issued 

other reports raising concerns about service coordination.2

You asked that we study the extent to which government agencies and 

programs are currently providing transportation services to the 

transportation-disadvantaged and coordinating the provision of these 

transportation services and that we update you on actions taken by the 

Coordinating Council since our 1999 report. This report addresses (1) the 

federal programs that provide transportation services for transportationdisadvantaged populations and the types of services they provide; (2) 

federal, state, and local government spending for transportation services 

through these federal programs;3

 (3) the extent of coordination among 

state, local, and federal agencies in delivering transportation services for 

the transportation-disadvantaged, including actions taken by the 

Coordinating Council; and (4) any obstacles that may impede effective 

coordination and potential options for overcoming such obstacles. 

Our overall approach was to (1) review federal laws and regulations 

governing the use of federal funds for services for transportationdisadvantaged populations; (2) analyze spending data where available; (3) 

review federal and other governmental activities and the research 

literature related to the coordination of transportation services; and (4) 

obtain the views of more than 100 officials from federal, state, and local 

government agencies, industry and client advocacy groups, and other 

experts involved with or affected by the coordination process on the 

obstacles and options for improving coordination. Many of these 

interviews were part of case studies that we conducted in five states—

Arizona, Florida, New York, South Dakota, and Wisconsin—to understand 

how these various federal programs were implemented and coordinated at 

the state and local level. We chose these states to include a cross section 

 1

U.S. General Accounting Office, Transportation Coordination: Benefits and Barriers 

Exist, and Planning Efforts Progress Slowly, GAO/RCED-00-1 (Washington, D.C.: Oct. 22, 

1999). 

2

U.S. General Accounting Office, Welfare Reform: Job Access Program Improves Local 

Service Coordination, but Evaluation Should Be Completed, GAO-03-204 (Washington, 

D.C.: Dec. 6, 2002); Hindrances to Coordinating Transportation of People Participating 

in Federally Funded Grant Programs: Volume I, GAO/RCED-77-119 (Washington, D.C.: 

Oct. 17, 1977). 

3

For the purposes of this report, spending refers to estimated or actual outlays or 

obligations, depending on what information was available from the agency. 
Page 3 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

of characteristics including urban/rural mix, geographic area of the 

country, and presence or absence of a state council or other coordinating 

body. Appendix I contains more information about our scope and 

methodology. 

We identified 62 federal programs—most of which are administered by the 

Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, Education, and 

Transportation—that are used to fund transportation services for 

transportation-disadvantaged populations. Sixteen of these seem 

particularly relevant in that the Community Transportation Association of 

America4

 identified them as being regularly used to fund transportation 

services. In addition, based on available information, we identified 11 

other programs that are notable, in that transportation spending under 

each one was at least $4 million in fiscal year 2001. While the remaining 

programs also fund transportation services, they do so minimally, or the 

extent of transportation services funded is unknown, according to 

program officials. Most programs purchase transportation services from 

existing private or public providers. For example, several programs in the 

Department of Labor typically provide bus tokens, and Medicaid providers 

often contract with local transportation providers.5

 In contrast, 

Department of Transportation programs and several others such as Head 

Start in the Department of Health and Human Services typically purchase 

and operate vehicles or modify them for use by individuals with 

disabilities. Several of these 62 programs are required to coordinate 

services they provide with other agencies providing similar services, 

which can include transportation. 

Federal, state, and local spending for these transportation services is in 

the billions of dollars, although the full extent of spending is unknown 

because transportation spending is not always tracked separately from 

other program spending. In the 29 programs for which we could obtain 

actual spending amounts or estimates from program officials, federal 

 4

The Community Transportation Association of America is a national, professional 

membership association that conducts research and provides technical assistance for 

community transportation providers. See Community Transportation Association of 

America, Building Mobility Partnerships: Opportunities for Federal Investment 

(Washington, D.C.: March 2002). 

5

Medicaid is a joint federal-state program to finance health care coverage for certain 

categories of low-income individuals, including families with children, persons with 

disabilities, and elderly individuals. 

Results in Brief 
Page 4 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

spending on transportation services for transportation-disadvantaged 

populations was at least $2.4 billion in fiscal year 2001. Department of 

Health and Human Services programs spent about three-quarters of this 

amount. State and local agencies also provide funding for many of these 

programs, often to fulfill matching requirements, which generally range 

from 5 to 50 percent of total program costs for these programs. Estimates 

of state and local spending are generally not available because few 

agencies track such information at the federal or state level. However, 

based on available information, it is evident that state and local 

contributions for these services are significant—at least several hundred 

million dollars. 

Efforts to improve services and achieve cost savings through coordination 

of transportation activities among agencies at all levels of government 

vary; however, in some areas we visited, close coordination among 

providers has shown promising results. Some local agencies have realized 

substantial benefits by coordinating their transportation services through 

sharing vehicles, consolidating services under a single agency, or sharing 

information about available services. For example, a transit agency in 

South Dakota consolidated the transportation services previously 

provided by both senior and medical centers as well as other federal, state, 

and local programs. This consolidation allowed the agency to expand its 

service hours and increase the number of trips provided while reducing 

the average cost of providing each trip by about 20 percent. We found 

instances, however, in which there were overlapping, fragmented, or 

confusing services among programs that did not coordinate. For example, 

a local official said that the vans delivering clients to the local job center 

are owned by many different programs, but because the programs do not 

coordinate, only a few people ride in each van. At the federal level, 

agencies have taken some limited steps to coordinate their transportation 

programs since our 1999 report.6

 For example, the Coordinating Council 

on Access and Mobility has finalized a strategic plan and issued guidelines 

for coordinating transportation services. However, the long-term goals and 

objectives in its strategic plan are generally not measurable, and they are 

not linked to the activities in the Council’s action plan. Also, the strategic 

and annual performance plans of the Departments of Transportation and 

Health and Human Services contain few references to coordination of 

programs for the transportation-disadvantaged, and the plans of the 

Departments of Labor, Education, and the other federal agencies contain 

 6

GAO/RCED-00-1. 
Page 5 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

no such references. In addition, the Coordinating Council only includes 

officials from two federal departments (Transportation and Health and 

Human Services), representing less than half of the 62 federal programs 

that can be used to fund services for the transportation-disadvantaged, 

while the Departments of Labor and Education, which administer onethird of the programs, are not members of the Council. Furthermore, while 

the Coordinating Council is working to improve its Web site, the site is not 

linked to the Web site of the Department of Health and Human Services, 

making it more difficult for human service agencies at all government 

levels to be aware of and access the site. 

Although decision makers face numerous obstacles in trying to coordinate 

transportation services for the transportation-disadvantaged, officials and 

experts that we consulted also offered several potential options to mitigate 

these obstacles and enhance coordination among federal, state, and local 

agencies. We grouped the obstacles into three categories: (1) reluctance to 

share vehicles and fund coordination activities due to concerns about 

possible adverse effects on clients; (2) different eligibility requirements, 

safety standards, and other programmatic requirements that can limit 

programs’ ability to share transportation resources; and (3) lack of 

leadership and commitment to coordinate, as evidenced by the limited 

guidance and information provided by federal and state agencies on the 

possible techniques for coordinating services. To mitigate these obstacles, 

officials and experts suggested three potential options. One option is to 

harmonize standards among federal programs—such as safety standards 

related to types of seat belts and driver training requirements—so that 

programs can serve additional populations or better share transportation 

resources. Another option is to expand interagency forums that would 

facilitate communication among agencies involved in coordination efforts 

and to share additional technical guidance and information on 

coordination among federal and state agencies through a central 

clearinghouse or improved Web site. The third option is to provide 

financial incentives or mandates that would give priority in federal funding 

to those grant applicants that show a strong commitment to coordinate or 

require specific coordination efforts among grant recipients as a condition 

of receiving federal funding. We did not assess the costs and benefits of 

these options; however, some would require extensive statutory or 

regulatory changes and could cause agencies to incur significant costs. 

Given the multiplicity of federal programs that can fund transportation 

services for the transportation-disadvantaged, and the significant amounts 

spent on those services, effective coordination efforts are needed to 

ensure that transportation services reach the greatest number of 
Page 6 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

recipients. Accordingly, our report contains several recommendations 

designed to strengthen and enhance coordination activities in the four 

federal departments that administer most of the programs that fund 

transportation services—Health and Human Services, Labor, Education, 

and Transportation. In commenting on the draft of this report, those four 

departments generally concurred with the findings and recommendations. 

In addition, we provided the draft report to two other departments that 

provide services to the transportation-disadvantaged—Housing and Urban 

Development and Veterans Affairs—and those departments also agreed 

with the findings. In some cases, these departments also provided 

technical clarifications, which were incorporated as appropriate to ensure 

accuracy. 

Many elderly, disabled, and low-income individuals face significant 

challenges in accessing transportation. For example, some of these 

challenges are as follows: 

• Sixteen percent of respondents over age 75 reported not having a driver’s 

license in 2001, and 25 percent of the respondents had not driven at least 

once in the last month according to an AARP survey.7

 Elderly people are 

also more likely to have difficulty accessing traditional public 

transportation due to physical ailments. 

• Thirty percent of respondents with disabilities reported difficulty in 

accessing transportation, compared to 10 percent of respondents without 

a disability, according to a 2000 survey by the National Organization on 

Disabilities. 

• Low-income households are less likely to own a car than other households 

due to the prohibitive cost of purchasing, insuring, and maintaining a car, 

and public transportation may not provide sufficient options for their 

needs. Over 90 percent of public assistance recipients do not own a car.8

 7

Anita Stowell Ritter, Audrey Straight, Ed Evans, Understanding Senior Transportation: 

Report and Analysis of a Survey of Consumers Age 50+ (Washington, D.C.: AARP Public 

Policy Institute, 2002). 

8

U.S. Federal Highway Administration and U.S. Federal Transit Administration, 2002 

Status of the Nation’s Highways, Bridges, and Transit: Conditions and Performance 

(Washington, D.C.: Department of Transportation, 2003). 

Background 
Page 7 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

The importance of coordinating transportation services for transportationdisadvantaged populations has been evident since the 1970s. In 1977, we 

issued a report on transportation coordination,9

 which concluded that the 

most significant hindrance to the coordination of transportation services 

under these programs was confusion at all levels of government as to how 

much coordination federally funded projects could engage in. Since 1986, 

responsibility for coordinating transportation programs at the federal level 

has rested in the Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility, which was 

created under a memorandum of understanding between the Department 

of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Department of 

Transportation (DOT). This body is composed of representatives from 

program offices within these departments, and employees of the two 

departments meet its staffing needs, on a part-time basis. 

More recent reviews have continued to identify a need for stronger efforts 

in this area. In a 1999 report on transportation coordination,10 we found 

that coordination efforts of the Coordinating Council, DOT, and HHS were 

ongoing but still needed strengthening. This report also noted that the 

Congress had endorsed increased coordination as evidenced by several 

provisions in the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century (TEA21),11 and significant financial benefits had been realized through 

coordination. In addition, reports by advocacy groups and transportation 

researchers have raised concerns over continuing duplication of effort 

among federal programs and certain sub-populations still not being served 

effectively.12

 9

GAO/RCED-77-119.

10GAO/RCED-00-1. 

11P.L. 105-178. 

12For example, a report prepared for AARP found that transportation resources for the 

elderly, disabled, and other groups were often not coordinated, leading to duplication of 

services. The services were also found to vary in quality and to fail to address the needs of 

individuals who did not meet specific agency or program eligibility requirements. See Jon 

E. Burkhardt, Coordinated Transportation Systems (Washington, D.C.: AARP, September 

2000). 
Page 8 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

We identified 62 federal programs that fund transportation services to 

populations that are transportation-disadvantaged.13 As shown in figure 1, 

the bulk of these programs are administered by four federal agencies—23 

programs in HHS, 15 programs in the Department of Labor (DOL), 8 

programs in the Department of Education, and 6 programs in DOT.14 The 

remaining 10 programs are administered by the Departments of Housing 

and Urban Development (HUD), Veterans Affairs (VA), Agriculture, and 

the Interior. A full listing of programs, their authorizing legislation, typical 

uses, types of trips provided, target populations, and spending information 

is found in appendix II. 

 13In addition to these 62 programs, it is likely that there other federal programs that could 

be used to fund transportation improvements or other transportation services. Our scope 

included programs that provide nonemergency, nonmilitary, surface transportation 

services, targeted to transportation-disadvantaged populations. We excluded most 

programs that were strictly for research or demonstration activities or provided strictly 

cash assistance with no restrictions on use, as well as some economic development 

programs that benefit the general public and are not targeted to transportationdisadvantaged populations. Efforts by other researchers to inventory all federal programs 

that could conceivably provide transportation yielded additional programs not found in our 

inventory due to differing selection criteria. See Building Mobility Partnerships: 

Opportunities for Federal Investment. 

14Two DOT programs that are included here, the Urbanized Area and Nonurbanized Area 

Formula Programs, are used to support mass transit intended for the general public, many 

of whom could conceivably provide their own transportation. We include them because the 

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990 (42 U.S.C. 126) requires that transit 

operators provide accessible paratransit service that is comparable to their regular service 

for disabled individuals who are unable to provide their own transportation or access the 

regular transit system, and TEA-21 allows a portion of these transit formula grants to be 

used to offset paratransit operating costs. 

Sixty-Two Federal 

Programs Fund 

Transportation 

Services to 

TransportationDisadvantaged 

Populations 
Page 9 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Figure 1: Number of Programs Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged, by Agency 

Many of the 62 programs are significantly involved in providing 

transportation services to their recipients. These include 16 programs 

identified by the Community Transportation Association of America 

(CTAA)15 as being routinely used to provide transportation and an 

additional 11 programs that we identified as spending at least $4 million 

for transportation services to transportation-disadvantaged populations in 

fiscal year 2001 on the basis of funding data or estimates that were 

available. The remaining programs also fund transportation services, but 

do so minimally, or the extent of transportation services funded is 

unknown, according to program officials. Table 1 shows the 16 programs 

identified by CTAA and how they provide transportation. These 16 

programs are administered by DOT, HHS, Education, and DOL. As the 

table shows, transportation is not the primary purpose of most of these 

programs. For example, Medicaid provides payments for medical services, 

and the Vocational Rehabilitation Grants Program provides training and 

employment services to individuals with disabilities. 

 15Building Mobility Partnerships: Opportunities for Federal Investment.
Page 10 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Table 1: Sixteen Programs Identified by CTAA as Regularly Providing Funding for Transportation 

Agency Program Description 

Department of 

Education 

Vocational 

Rehabilitation Grants 

Assists states in operating programs that provide vocational rehabilitation services 

for individuals with disabilities. Services include counseling, training, job placement, 

and other supportive services, including transportation. 

Grants for Supportive 

Services and Senior 

Centers 

Assists states in developing a community-based system of services for older 

individuals. Services provided include nutrition services, caregiver support services, 

senior centers, and transportation services. 

Program for American 

Indian, Alaskan Native, 

and Native Hawaiian 

Elders 

Assists tribal organizations in the delivery of supportive services to older Native 

Americans. Services provided include nutrition services, caregiver support services, 

senior centers, and transportation services. 

Head Start Assists local grantees in providing a program of comprehensive health, educational, 

and other services to promote school readiness for low-income children. 

Transportation to and from program services is generally provided. 

Medicaid Assists states in payments for medical assistance to populations that meet 

categorical eligibility (such as families with children or persons who are elderly or 

disabled) as well as income and resource requirements. States are required to 

assure transportation to medical services. 

Department of 

Health and Human 

Services 

Temporary Assistance 

for Needy Families 

Provides grants to states or tribes to assist needy families with children. Grantees 

have the flexibility to use funds in any manner that meets the purposes of the 

program, which can include transportation to services. 

Senior Community 

Service Employment 

Program 

Assists states and other grantees in providing work opportunities in community 

service activities for low-income individuals 55 years of age and older. Transportation 

to training and job placements can be provided. 

Workforce Investment 

Act Adult Services 

Program 

Assists states in providing workforce investment activities. “Intensive” services 

provided to low-income participants include occupational and basic skills training, 

and transportation can be provided to access such services. 

Workforce Investment 

Act Dislocated Worker 

Program 

Assists states in providing workforce investment activities. “Intensive” services 

provided to low-income participants include occupational and basic skills training, 

and transportation can be provided to access such services. 

Department of 

Labor 

Workforce Investment 

Act Youth Activities 

Assists states in providing workforce investment activities that will help low-income 

youth acquire the skills, training, and support needed to achieve employment 

success. Transportation can be provided to access services. 

Capital Investment 

Grants 

Assists states in financing facilities for use in mass public transportation service. 

Projects can include those that are designed to meet the special needs of elderly or 

disabled individuals. 

Urbanized Area 

Formula Program 

Assists urbanized areas in financing capital projects for use in mass transportation 

service. Ten percent of funds may be used to pay for ADA paratransit operating 

costs.a

 

Nonurbanized Area 

Formula Program 

Assists nonurbanized areas with capital and operating expenses needed to provide 

public transportation service. Ten percent of funds may be used to pay for ADA 

paratransit operating costs. 

Job Access and 

Reverse Commute 

Provides grants to develop transportation services to connect low-income persons to 

employment and support services. Funds can be used for capital and operating costs 

associated with new or expanded service. 

Department of 

Transportation 

Capital and Training 

Assistance for Overthe-Road Bus 

Accessibility 

Assists private operators of over-the-road buses with financing capital and training 

costs associated with making buses accessible to individuals with disabilities. 
Page 11 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Agency Program Description 

 Capital Assistance 

Program for Elderly 

Persons and Persons 

with Disabilities 

Provides financial assistance to nonprofit organizations in meeting the transportation 

needs of elderly persons and persons with disabilities where public transportation 

services are unavailable, insufficient, or inappropriate. Funds may be used for 

eligible capital expenses, such as purchasing vehicles, or to contract for service. 

Sources: CTAA and Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance. 

a

The ADA required that all fixed route transportation services and facilities be accessible to individuals 

with disabilities, including wheelchair users. While the ADA gave priority to providing such 

transportation in the same vehicles used by the general riding public, it also required complimentary 

paratransit systems as a “safety net” for individuals whose disabilities prevent them from using 

accessible fixed-route services. 

Table 2 shows the 11 programs we identified as spending at least $4 

million on transportation for the transportation-disadvantaged in fiscal 

year 2001. 

Table 2: Eleven Programs Spending at Least $4 Million in Fiscal Year 2001 

Agency Program 

Department of Agriculture Food Stamp Employment and Training Program 

Department of Education 21st-Century Community Learning Centers 

Department of Labor Job Corps 

Community Health Centers 

HIV Care Grants 

Social Services Block Grants 

Department of Health and 

Human Services 

State Children’s Health Insurance Program 

Department of Housing and Community Development Block Grant 

Urban Development Supportive Housing Program 

Automobiles and Adaptive Equipment for Certain 

Disabled Veterans 

Department of Veterans Affairs 

Veterans Medical Care 

Source: GAO. 

Under most of the federal programs providing transportation services, 

funding recipients typically purchase the services from existing sources, 

according to program officials. This includes contracting for services with 

private transportation providers or providing bus tokens, transit passes, 

taxi vouchers, mileage reimbursement to volunteers or program 

participants, or some combination of these methods. For example, 

recipients of funds from DOL’s Workforce Investment Act Adult Services 

Program typically provide bus tokens or mileage reimbursement for 

participants to access training, while recipients of HHS’s Grants for 

Supportive Services and Senior Centers most often contract with local 

transportation providers to provide client transportation. The funding 

recipients of several programs, however, typically purchase and operate 
Page 12 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

vehicles, or modify existing vehicles for use by individuals with 

disabilities. These programs include Head Start and the Program for 

American Indian, Alaskan Native, and Hawaiian Elders in HHS; the 

Vocational Rehabilitation Grants Program in the Department of Education; 

and the six programs within DOT. 

Several of these programs have requirements for grantees to coordinate 

their services with other agencies providing similar services, which would 

include transportation, among other services. For example, Head Start 

grantees are required to make every reasonable effort to coordinate 

transportation services they provide with other human service 

transportation in their communities. Similarly, DOT’s Capital Assistance 

Program for Elderly Persons and Persons with Disabilities, Job Access and 

Reverse Commute, and Nonurbanized Area Formula Program have 

requirements for grantees to coordinate their transportation services. In 

addition, some programs have provisions designed to avoid duplication of 

effort and encourage the use of existing community resources. For 

example, Workforce Investment Act programs may use funds to support 

those who are participating in the program only if those individuals are 

unable to obtain services through other programs, according to program 

officials. Also, the Veterans’ Workforce Investment Program requires 

grantees to provide information on the linkages this program will have 

with other providers of services to benefit veterans. 

Available information shows that federal programs spent an estimated $2.4 

billion on transportation services for transportation-disadvantaged 

populations in fiscal year 2001, and additional state and local spending for 

these populations was several hundred million dollars more. Complete 

spending information is not available because many federal funding 

recipients are not required to distinguish transportation from other 

spending when reporting spending information to federal agencies. 

Extent of Spending on 

Services for the 

TransportationDisadvantaged Is Not 

Fully Known but Is in 

the Billions of Dollars 
Page 13 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Information on federal spending for transportation is available for 29 of 

the 62 programs we identified.16 These programs spent an estimated $2.4 

billion on transportation services in fiscal year 2001. (Appendix II lists 

available spending data for each federal program.) Based on available 

information, HHS programs as a whole spent the most on transportation 

for transportation-disadvantaged populations in 2001—an estimated $1.8 

billion. Table 3 shows estimated transportation spending by the eight 

federal agencies that fund services for the transportation-disadvantaged. 

Table 3: Estimated Spending on Transportation Services for the Transportation-Disadvantaged by Eight Federal Agencies in 

Fiscal Year 2001 

Agency 

Amount spent on 

transportation for 

transportationdisadvantaged 

(in millions) 

Percent of total 

estimate 

Number of programs 

included in estimate 

Total number of 

programs that provide 

transportation

Department of Health and 

Human Services $1,771.0 72.4% 10 23

Department of Transportation $317.3 13.0% 6 6

Department of Veterans Affairs $160.8 6.6% 3 3

Department of Education $135.3 5.5% 2 8

Department of Labor $26.4 1.1% 3 15

Department of Housing and 

Urban Development $21.7 0.9% 4 4

Department of Agriculture $13.0 0.5% 1 1

Department of the Interior Not available 0.0% 0 2

Total (for 8 agencies) $2,445.5 100.0% 29 62

Sources: GAO summary of HHS, DOT, VA, Education, DOL, Agriculture, HUD, and Interior data and estimates. 

More than three-quarters of our estimate is based on spending for 

transportation in five programs. Of the five, Medicaid and Head Start, both 

in HHS, spent the most on transportation in fiscal year 2001—an estimated 

$976.2 million and $514.5 million, respectively. The three other programs, 

all of which spent more than $100 million on services for the 

transportation-disadvantaged in fiscal year 2001, were DOT’s Capital 

Assistance Program for Elderly Persons and Persons with Disabilities, 

 16Of these 29 programs, 17 provided actual spending data for fiscal year 2001. Program 

officials for the remaining 12 programs provided an estimate of transportation spending for 

2001. 

Spending by 29 Federal 

Programs Is Estimated at 

$2.4 billion in Fiscal Year 

2001 
Page 14 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

HHS’s Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), and VA’s 

Veterans Medical Care Benefits. 

The amount spent on transportation services by the remaining 33 federal 

programs is unknown, mainly because the majority of programs do not 

require recipients of federal funds to report transportation spending 

information to the federal agency.17

Total state and local spending for transportation services, which 

supplements federal spending for such programs, is likely significant—at 

least in the hundreds of millions of dollars—although the total is unknown 

because most programs do not require grantees to report these data. 

Matching requirements, which represent the nonfederal contributions to 

the program’s costs that come from state, local, or private funds, provide 

some information on state and local spending on transportation for the 

transportation-disadvantaged. About half of the 62 programs have 

matching requirements that generally require states and localities to 

contribute between 5 and 50 percent of total costs.18 Additionally, limited 

information from officials in the five states we visited indicates that total 

 17Total program obligations for these 33 programs were about $14.8 billion in fiscal year 

2001. While information was not available on the portion of the $14.8 billion devoted to 

providing transportation services, we were able to analyze data on other human services 

programs which indicate that, on average, about 3 percent of total spending on those 

programs was devoted to transportation. We do not know whether this 3 percent is an 

appropriate estimate of transportation spending for these 33 programs because grantees 

are not required to report transportation spending information to the federal agency. 

Furthermore, several officials who administer programs that had no spending data told us 

that transportation services probably represented less than 1 percent of their total program 

spending. 

18It is difficult to determine the amount of nonfederal contributions to transportation 

services on the basis of matching requirements because grantees are generally required to 

match total program spending rather than spending for a particular service, such as 

transportation. To illustrate, Head Start grantees are required to contribute 20 percent of 

total program costs, not necessarily 20 percent of transportation costs. Transportation 

under the program could be entirely funded from federal dollars while the local share is 

used to fund teachers or other program costs. The issue is further complicated because 

some of these programs have maintenance of effort (MOE) requirements (which require 

states and localities to maintain their contributions to a program at some pre-determined 

level) rather than matching requirements. Under the TANF program, for example, the 

state’s MOE requirement is determined through an index against the amount the state spent 

for fiscal year 1994 under the Aid to Families with Dependent Children program. MOE 

funds will, therefore, constitute a different percentage of total program spending for each 

state in each year. 

State and Local 

Transportation Spending Is 

Unknown, but Is Likely 

Significant 
Page 15 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

state and local spending on transportation runs into the hundreds of 

millions of dollars. For example: 

• Nonfederal contributions for Medicaid nonemergency transportation 

ranged from 32 to 50 percent of the total spending on this service in the 

five states that we visited.19 In New York, 50 percent, or an estimated 

$139.4 million, of the state’s total spending on Medicaid funded 

transportation in 2001 was from nonfederal sources. In Florida and 

Wisconsin approximately 40 percent of the total amount spent on 

nonemergency medical transportation in the state was from nonfederal 

sources; state contributions in those states were $28.6 million and $13.4 

million, respectively, in 2001. In Arizona and South Dakota, approximately 

one-third of the total amount spent on Medicaid transportation was from 

nonfederal sources in those states in 2001, approximately $7.0 million and 

$490,000, respectively. 

• In Wisconsin nearly 38 percent, or $922,000, of the funding to provide 

transportation services through DOT’s Capital Assistance Program for 

Elderly Persons and Persons with Disabilities in 2001 was from nonfederal 

sources. The program requires grantees to provide 20 percent of total 

program funding. 

• In New York, about 30 percent of the spending on transportation under the 

Department of Education’s Vocational Rehabilitation Program in 2002, or 

$2.6 million, was from nonfederal sources.20 Similarly, about 27 percent or 

$673,000 of Florida’s funding was from nonfederal sources in 2001. The 

program requires states to contribute 21.3 percent of total costs. 

Although some states and localities currently spend a significant amount 

for transportation through federal programs, many now face budget 

deficits that could diminish their future contribution to these programs. In 

a 2003 survey by the National Conference of State Legislatures,21 36 states 

 19The amount that states are required to contribute depends on how states claim 

transportation under Medicaid. If states claim Medicaid as an optional medical expense, 

the state or local portion ranges from 17 to 50 percent of total costs, based on a measure 

known as the Federal Medical Assistance Percentage. If states claim transportation as an 

administrative expense, the state or local portion is 50 percent of total costs. 

20Data for state fiscal year 2001 were not available. Program officials indicate that there 

should not be significant differences in 2001 and 2002 spending information. 

21National Conference of State Legislatures, State Budget Update: February 2003 

(Washington, D.C.: February 2003). 
Page 16 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

reported budget deficits midway through their fiscal year. Fifteen of these 

states reported deficits in excess of 5 percent of the state budget, and four 

states are facing deficits greater than 10 percent of the state budget. 

Because 49 states have balanced budget requirements, such large deficits 

could lead to a decrease in the amount of funds available to states for 

programmatic spending, including transportation programs. For example, 

according to the National Conference of State Legislatures report, 29 

states have imposed across-the-board cuts in response to budget deficits. 

State budget deficits have affected state transportation spending 

differently in the five states that we visited. For example: 

• Two of the states have cut their state programs that local grantees used to 

fund services for the transportation-disadvantaged, according to 

transportation officials in those states. In one state, the state legislature 

eliminated the state’s transportation assistance program to help deal with 

the state’s budget deficit; as a result, the state official and the director of a 

senior center in the state said that some of the projects funded through the 

program will likely be discontinued because grantees cannot find 

replacement funds. In the other state, the state legislature cut a state fund 

that grantees used to supplement federal transportation funding. 

According to an official, the loss of this fund, combined with the 

increasing costs of fuel and insurance, may lead providers to cut service to 

transportation-disadvantaged populations by as much as 40 percent. 

• In another state, the Governor’s plan for closing the state’s budget gap 

includes reducing spending on Medicaid nonemergency medical 

transportation by $5 million, or 7.6 percent; however, the state’s fund 

dedicated to providing other services for the transportation-disadvantaged 

was not recommended for cuts. 

• Transportation officials in two states told us that they had not yet 

experienced cuts in state funding for services for the transportationdisadvantaged. In one of the states, local grantees rely on a state 

transportation fund and a large set-aside of TANF funds to provide 

services to transportation-disadvantaged populations. Without these two 

funds, local grantees would have difficulty financing services for the 

transportation-disadvantaged, according to an official. The other state is 

not currently anticipating cuts in state funding for services for 

transportation-disadvantaged populations, however, according to an 

official, the full impact of the fiscal situation in that state will not be 

known until local governments develop program budgets for 2004 because 

the local governments—which are also facing budget constraints—play a 

key role in determining what services will be provided. 
Page 17 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

While some states are not currently experiencing reductions in their 

transportation programs, many states are anticipating that budget deficits 

will continue into 2004. According to the National Conference of State 

Legislatures report, 36 states are anticipating budget gaps for 2004; nearly 

all of these states anticipate gaps greater than 5 percent of their state 

budget and half of these states expect gaps greater than 10 percent.22

Efforts to improve services and achieve cost savings through coordination 

of transportation activities among agencies at all levels of government 

vary. At the state and local levels, the extent and the type of coordination 

activities differ, ranging from one state body providing guidance and 

overseeing coordination efforts for most of its programs to two local 

agencies sharing vehicles. In some areas within the five states we visited, 

coordination among providers has resulted in significant benefits, such as 

improved customer service and lower unit costs. However, we also found 

some examples of overlapping, fragmented, or confusing services resulting 

from a lack of coordination. At the federal level, DOT, HHS, and—to some 

extent—DOL have undertaken some activities aimed at improving 

coordination among their programs. DOT and HHS implement many of 

their activities through the Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility. 

However, DOT and HHS make only a few mentions of coordinating 

services for the transportation-disadvantaged in their strategic and annual 

performance plans, and other agencies do not mention such activities at 

all. Also, several federal agencies that provide services to the 

transportation-disadvantaged are not involved in coordination efforts at 

the national level. 

While agencies within each state we visited were involved in some form of 

coordination, the extent of coordination of transportation services varies 

widely. For example, Florida has a state organization that oversees the 

coordination of most of the transportation services for the transportationdisadvantaged, while some other states we visited had no statewide 

coordination body. Even in states without such a coordinating body, 

however, some state and local agencies are engaged in coordination 

efforts. This variation also occurred in the nation as a whole, according to 

data from a preliminary report by the National Academy of Sciences’ 

Transportation Research Board, which found that roughly half of U.S. 

 22Eleven states and the District of Columbia did not report 2004 budget deficit information. 

Coordination Efforts 

Vary, but Some 

Successful Efforts 

Show Promising 

Results 

Extent of State and Local 

Transportation 

Coordination Varies 
Page 18 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

states have a state transportation coordinating body. 23 (See appendix III 

for information on the type of coordination in the five states we visited 

and the state agencies involved.) 

Within each state, local efforts also varied. Examples of coordination 

activities include the following: 

Coordinated planning: In this type of coordination, some combination of 

human service and transportation agencies and providers work together to 

plan transportation services for their clients. For example, in northwestern 

Wisconsin, at the initiative of staff from a center for independent living, 

the Area Consortium on Transportation was formed in 2001 to improve the 

planning and provision of transportation for the disabled and others who 

are transit-dependent. The council—which consists of consumers, transit 

providers, county and city officials, disability organizations, and aging 

groups—is instituting several pilot programs to test various methods of 

coordination. 

Brokerage: 24 In this type of coordination, one agency or provider serves as 

the central point of contact for providing ride and eligibility information or 

actually arranging transportation services for clients of multiple programs. 

For example, officials in several New York counties wanted to maximize 

residents’ mobility by coordinating transportation services offered by 

various federal and state programs, but lacked the expertise or start-up 

costs to do so. With a grant from the state Departments of Transportation 

and Health, the counties instituted a coordination demonstration project 

whereby one agency arranges an average of 2,500 daily trips for clients 

from a number of populations—such as the disabled, senior citizens, 

former welfare recipients, and others—served by different federal and 

state programs. 

 23Westat, Toolkit for Rural Community Coordinated Transportation Services, Transit 

Cooperative Research Project of the Transportation Research Board, Project B-24, Interim 

Report (Rockville, MD: March 2002). 

24The Community Transportation Association of America defines brokerage as a method of 

providing transportation where riders are matched with appropriate transportation 

providers through a central trip-request and administration facility. The transportation 

broker may centralize vehicle dispatch, record keeping, vehicle maintenance, and other 

functions under contractual arrangements with agencies, municipalities, and other 

organizations. Actual trips are provided by a number of different vendors. 
Page 19 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Shared use of vehicles among multiple programs: In this type of 

coordination, one agency may provide transportation for clients of 

multiple programs, or each program may own its own vehicles but allow 

them to be used by other programs. For example, in Arizona, vans from 

one county’s vocational rehabilitation center travel to a neighboring 

county to pick up program clients. While there, they also transport clients 

of Jobs Administration programs. The two programs split the cost of 

transportation equally. 

Appendix IV contains a list of some informational resources available for 

agencies interested in coordinating. 

In some areas we visited, coordination among providers—through sharing 

vehicles, consolidating services under a single agency, or sharing 

information about available services—has resulted in significant benefits, 

such as improved customer service and lower unit costs. State and local 

agencies providing transportation under the 62 federal programs often 

serve similar client groups, provide similar services, and operate in similar 

geographic areas, so there can be duplication of effort and inefficiency in 

providing transportation when those agencies do not coordinate. In our 

site visits, we found several examples of overlapping, fragmented, or 

confusing services in places where agencies were not coordinating. 

Through coordination, some local agencies have realized both improved 

levels of service and financial benefits, such as reduced costs of providing 

each trip, as follows: 

Improved customer service: 

• A coordinated system in central Florida provides transportation for 

Medicaid, vocational rehabilitation, and other programs. According to 

local officials, vans used to show up late, if at all, and clients had difficulty 

finding out the status of their ride. Since consolidating services under a 

single provider and bringing scheduling and dispatch services in-house, 

officials report service improvement. 

• Through collaboration, information-sharing, and cost-sharing among 

county agencies, the Clinton County transit system in New York serves 

both Medicaid and elderly populations, making it easier for those 

populations to access medical and community services because they only 

have to be familiar with one system. 

Coordination Has Led to 

Improvements, While Lack 

of Coordination Can Result 

in Overlap 

Benefits of Coordination 
Page 20 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

• A federal regional official said that coordination could remove the stigma 

of specialized transportation because all recipients use the same service 

and are treated equally. 

Financial benefits: 

• Three New York counties joined in a transportation brokering service that 

saved an estimated $92,000 in 2001 by identifying a lower-cost alternative 

means of transportation, that is, moving groups of clients in buses rather 

than transporting individual clients in taxis. This brokerage service 

provides transportation to Medicaid patients, the disabled, veterans, and 

other client groups. 

• In Aberdeen, South Dakota, the local transit agency consolidated the 

transportation services previously provided by both senior and medical 

centers as well as other federal, state, and local programs. This 

consolidation allowed the agency to increase the number of trips provided 

while reducing the average cost of providing each trip by about 20 

percent—from about $5 to $4. The agency has also improved its services 

by coordinating with local taxi companies to provide night and weekend 

trips. 

Although the various programs we reviewed target specific populations, 

some populations are eligible to receive transportation services from 

multiple programs, resulting in duplication and inefficiency in some cases. 

In our visits with state and local transportation and human service 

agencies and providers, officials we interviewed identified several 

examples of overlapping services in areas or programs that were not 

coordinating. A for-profit transportation provider in one state told us that 

he often has two vehicles overlap on the same route at the same time, one 

for medical trips and one for paratransit,25 because it is too difficult to mix 

clients due to complicated fee structures and paperwork requirements 

imposed by the state for the two programs. An official from a workforce 

development program in another state told us that many programs in his 

county use their own vans to deliver clients to the job center, but because 

the programs do not coordinate, only a few people ride in each van. In 

another locality that state and local officials said has had difficulty 

coordinating, several human service providers hired a consultant to study 

 25Paratransit most often refers to wheelchair-accessible, demand-response van service, 

according to the Community Transportation Association of America, and is more flexible 

than fixed route transit but more structured than the use of a private automobile. 

Effects of a Lack of 

Coordination 
Page 21 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

the extent to which various agencies provide similar transportation 

services within a geographic region. This research showed substantial 

overlap in local services for the transportation-disadvantaged, as shown in 

figure 2. The consultant identified ways in which the number of routes 

could be substantially reduced through better coordination, which are 

being considered by the agencies involved. 

Figure 2: Overlapping Daily Routes of Vehicles Serving the TransportationDisadvantaged in Sioux Falls, South Dakota 

Note: This picture shows the daily routes of vehicles operated by seven different agencies in the 

same region of Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Overlap occurs when routes have the same or nearby 

starting and ending points and are transporting similar clients at similar times. This graphic illustrates 

that many of these agencies have similar starting and ending points. Among the agencies shown in 

this graphic are two vocational rehabilitation agencies (serving the same general population) as well 

as agencies that serve low-income clients or clients with disabilities. While the graphic cannot show 

the time element, many of these routes represent trips occurring within 30 minutes of each other in 

the morning and afternoon. 
Page 22 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

State and local officials also provided examples of fragmented services 

and confusion in localities without coordinated programs. One official in 

an uncoordinated area said that a lack of coordination results in 

fragmented services, placing a burden on people who receive 

transportation through many different programs, depending on trip 

purpose, because they must be familiar with multiple systems, rules, and 

requirements. Fragmentation also occurs when adjoining counties do not 

coordinate their public transportation routes, leaving riders stranded due 

to unconnected transit systems. In one state, local officials told us that 

paratransit services do not extend beyond county lines, so people have to 

schedule two separate trips to get from their homes in one county to 

medical services in an adjoining county. When the first paratransit ride is 

behind schedule, a passenger sometimes has to wait for hours for the 

connecting ride. A provider in another state has contracts to provide 

transportation services for clients in multiple human service programs. 

Because of a lack of coordination among those programs, the 

transportation provider said that his company has to maintain two 

separate dispatching and reservation systems for its vehicles to comply 

with differing reporting and eligibility requirements. Vehicles can only 

operate under one dispatching system at a time, so the drivers cannot 

provide rides to more than one type of client at a time. The provider also 

said that clients who call for rides are confused by the sheer number of 

programs, and the agents who make their reservations do not know for 

which programs the clients are eligible. 

Although the Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility and various 

federal agencies have taken a number of steps to improve coordination, 

these efforts have had mixed results. 

As shown in table 4, the Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility—a 

body consisting of representatives from DOT and HHS—has responded to 

three of the recommendations we made in our 1999 report26 by adopting a 

strategic plan, developing an action plan, and helping to ensure that 

planned coordination efforts reinforce one another by issuing guidelines 

for coordinating transportation services. Goals and objectives in the 

strategic plan include such things as promoting interdepartmental 

collaboration at the federal level through the development of a joint 

agenda for transportation research that is of common use to multiple 

 26GAO/RCED-00-1. 

Federal Progress toward 

Improved Coordination 

Varies 

Some Prior Recommendations 

to the Coordinating Council 

Have Been Implemented 
Page 23 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

federal departments. According to the most recent action plan, the Council 

has completed some activities, such as producing a series of “how to” 

publications on using intelligent transportation systems to assist in the 

coordination of HHS programs with local transit agencies. 

Table 4: Status of Federal Responses to GAO’s Recommendations to Improve 

Coordination 

Recommendations from 1999 GAO report Completed Under way

The DOT/ HHS Coordinating Council on Access and 

Mobility should adopt a prioritized strategic plan. 

X 

The Coordinating Council should develop an action plan 

with specific responsibilities. 

X 

The Coordinating Council should issue an annual report 

on its major initiatives and accomplishments to the 

Secretaries of DOT and HHS. 

 X

DOT and HHS should ensure that planned coordination 

efforts reinforce one another. 

X 

DOT and HHS should direct their regional working 

groups to assess obstacles to transportation 

coordination. 

 X

The Coordinating Council should strengthen its Web site 

and make information available on obstacles to 

coordination and strategies to overcome them. 

 X

Source: GAO. 

The Council’s responses to the other three recommendations are still 

ongoing. For example, Council representatives told us that they plan to 

issue their first annual report on coordination achievements in June 2003, 

although this report was originally due to be issued in October 2000, 

according to the Council’s strategic plan. With regard to the 

recommendation on regional working groups, the 10 DOT and HHS 

regional offices have been convening workshops with state transportation 

officials during 2003 to discuss obstacles to coordination and other issues. 

Finally, the Council’s efforts to strengthen its Web site have had mixed 

results. One of the tasks listed in the Council’s strategic plan is to develop 

and maintain a Web site that would, among other things, enhance the 

exchange of coordination ideas, issues, and concerns. The Council has 

developed a Web site27—operated by DOT in conjunction with CTAA—that 

is reachable through a link on the Federal Transit Administration’s section 

of DOT’s Web site. However, there is no similar link from HHS’s Web site 

 27www.fta.dot.gov/CCAM/www.index.html.
Page 24 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

(or the Web sites of other federal agencies that fund transportation 

services for the transportation-disadvantaged), possibly making it more 

difficult for human service and other agencies to be aware of and access 

the site. In addition, the site does not yet contain specific information on 

obstacles to coordination or strategies for overcoming them, which we 

recommended in 1999, though it does contain links to some reports on the 

subject. There is also a page from which viewers can E-mail the Council 

with questions or suggestions. The Council is working with CTAA to 

further strengthen the site. 

Through the Council, DOT and HHS have sponsored a number of other 

efforts to enhance coordination. For example, as part of an item in the 

Council’s action plan, DOT and HHS helped initiate a consortium of 

national professional organizations and interest groups28 to conduct 

research and provide educational activities related to coordinating 

services for the transportation-disadvantaged. Among other tasks, the 

consortium has been asked to pursue several items from the Council’s 

action plan, such as identifying promising practices and obstacles in 

transportation coordination and developing strategies for addressing the 

obstacles. Officials from the Council said that working with the 

consortium provides a depth of knowledge and experience because 

consortium members represent local as well as national interests so that 

issues are pursued “from both ends.” 

As part of the upcoming regional workshops sponsored by the DOT and 

HHS regional offices, participants will discuss expanded opportunities for 

achieving more coordinated delivery of transportation services in medical, 

aging, and other assistance programs, and technical assistance resources 

will be shared with participants. Intended audiences include state 

transportation coordinating councils; state agencies that administer 

medical, aging, and other assistance programs; and agencies serving 

individuals with disabilities. According to DOT and HHS, participants will 

be asked to develop state transportation coordination action plans for 

their home state, and resources will be made available to assist states in 

 28To date, the consortium consists of the AARP, Amalgamated Transit Union, American 

Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, American Public Transportation 

Association, American Public Human Services Association, American Public Works 

Association, American Red Cross, Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations, 

Children’s Health Fund, Community Transportation Association of America, Easter Seals 

Project Action, National Association of Area Agencies on Aging, National Conference of 

State Legislatures, National Governor’s Association, and the Taxicab, Limousine, and 

Paratransit Association. 

DOT and HHS Have Sponsored 

Other Coordination Activities 
Page 25 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

implementing their plans following the workshop. (See appendix III for 

more information on federal coordination activities.) 

Because it is not a federal executive branch agency, the Coordinating 

Council is not subject to the requirements of the Government Performance 

and Results Act (GPRA) of 199329 and, therefore, does not have to follow 

the act’s guidance for producing strategic plans, annual performance 

plans, and annual reports. However, there are several best practices in 

strategic planning that could be useful guides for improving the Council’s 

strategic plan when it is updated at the end of 2003 and the action plan 

when it is next updated. For example, the current strategic plan does not 

contain an overall mission statement for the Council or performance 

measures that clearly relate to its long-term goals and objectives, both of 

which are considered best practices in strategic planning.30 In addition, 

there are no explicit links between the stated goals and objectives in the 

strategic plan and the activities in the action plan. For example, the 

current action plan includes seven tasks related to the use of information 

technology systems, but those tasks are not clearly linked to any of the 

Council’s long-term goals or objectives. 

Because the Council has no funding or full-time staff of its own, it is 

dependent on support from HHS and DOT. However, neither department 

currently highlights the coordination of services for the transportationdisadvantaged as a priority in its long-term strategic plan or annual 

performance plan. According to GPRA guidance, agencies are encouraged 

to identify programs with common purposes or crosscutting issues in their 

strategic plans. In addition, the agencies’ annual performance plans should 

identify performance goals that reflect activities being undertaken to 

support programs of a crosscutting nature, and show evidence of 

coordination among crosscutting programs.31 DOT’s most recent strategic 

plan and performance plan do not explicitly mention the Coordinating 

Council, although both briefly discuss coordinating special-needs 

transportation with other federal agencies under DOT’s Job Access and 

Reverse Commute (JARC) program. However, there is no mention of 

coordination of DOT’s Transit Capital Assistance Program for Elderly 

 29P.L. 103-62. 

30U.S. General Accounting Office, Agencies’ Strategic Plans Under GPRA: Key Questions 

to Facilitate Congressional Review, GAO/GGD-10.1.16 (Washington, D.C.: May 1, 1997). 

31U.S. General Accounting Office, The Results Act: An Evaluator’s Guide to Assessing 

Agency Annual Performance Plans, GAO/GGD-10.1.20 (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 1, 1998). 

Coordination Remains Largely 

Unaddressed in Strategic 

Planning Efforts 
Page 26 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Persons and Persons with Disabilities with other programs for elderly or 

disabled populations.32 At the subagency level, the Federal Transit 

Administration’s strategic plan includes the Coordinating Council in an 

appendix on coordination of crosscutting functions, under the strategic 

goal of promoting economic growth and trade, and its performance plan 

mentions working with the Council under a different goal—that of 

promoting mobility and accessibility.33

HHS’s current strategic plan does not discuss coordination of 

transportation services with other agencies, but its draft plan for 2003-2008 

specifically lists DOT and state and local transportation and human service 

agencies as important partners in providing transportation to access 

services in distressed communities and for health care and employment 

and training programs elsewhere. Education, DOL, HUD, and VA are not 

listed, however.34 The performance plans of individual HHS components 

vary widely in their treatment of transportation coordination. For 

example, the performance plan of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid 

does not mention transportation at all, while the Administration on Aging’s 

performance plan states that the agency works closely with HHS and DOT 

officials on the Coordinating Council in pursuit of improved transportation 

services. 

The strategic and annual performance plans of the other federal agencies 

that fund transportation services for the transportation-disadvantaged 

generally do not mention coordination of such services. 

Other federal agencies are also involved in some coordination efforts 

outside the scope of the Council. For example, DOL is working with CTAA 

and DOT to implement several rounds of pilot projects testing various 

transportation strategies in support of local one-stop employment and 

 32U.S. Department of Transportation, Strategic Plan 2000-2005 (September 2000) and U.S. 

Department of Transportation, Performance Plan-FY 2004 (Washington, D.C.: February 

2003). 

33U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Transit Administration, Strategic Plan 1998-

2002 (Washington, D.C.: March 1998) and U.S. Department of Transportation Federal 

Transit Administration FY 2002 Performance Plan. 

34U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, draft of Strategic Plan Fiscal Years 

2003-2008, Appendix A (Washington, D.C.: July 2002). 

Other Federal Agencies Are 

Involved in Some Coordination 

Efforts 
Page 27 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

training centers.35 Officials from DOT and DOL are also in the process of 

developing guidelines for using Workforce Investment Act funds (a DOL 

program) for Job Access purposes (a DOT program). In addition, some of 

DOL’s research studies and technical assistance materials provide 

examples of transportation coordination efforts.36 However, we did not 

find examples of involvement in transportation coordination efforts at the 

national level at the Departments of Education, HUD, and VA, although 

some of these agencies are involved in transportation working groups in 

some of the federal regional offices. The membership of the Coordinating 

Council only consists of DOT and HHS officials, representing less than half 

of the 62 federal programs that can be used to fund services for the 

transportation-disadvantaged. Although these two agencies comprise the 

majority of funding for transportation that we were able to identify, the 

Departments of Labor and Education also have a significant number of 

programs—more than one-third of the total—that provide services to the 

transportation-disadvantaged. Officials from the Council said that other 

agencies had expressed interest in coordination activities and had been 

invited to observe Council meetings in the past, but only DOL sent a 

representative for a short time period.37 Council officials said it would be 

very beneficial to have other agencies formally involved in their 

coordination efforts, which would require a renewal of the Council’s 

charter and memorandums of understanding among all agencies involved 

as well as other formal mechanisms to ensure that the proper people are 

engaged in the effort. 

 35In an effort to coordinate service delivery for employment and training programs, the 

Workforce Investment Act established one-stop centers in all states. Individuals seeking 

employment opportunities and training can receive services from more than a dozen 

federal programs that are required to offer their services through these one-stop centers. 

36See “One-Stop Innovations: Leading Change under the WIA One-Stop System,” a report 

prepared for the U.S. Department of Labor by the John H. Heldrich Center for Workforce 

Development at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey (Mar. 12, 2002). 

37In addition, one of DOL’s divisions in 2001 had a liaison to the Council’s Technical 

Committee—which focused on coordinating employment programs for low-income 

individuals. However, the DOL liaison indicated that little activity ensued after the liaison 

briefed the committee on the one-stop centers, and the committee later went dormant with 

the change in administration. 
Page 28 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Although some federal, state, and local agencies encourage the 

coordination of services for the transportation-disadvantaged and some 

coordination efforts have been established, federal, state, and local 

officials, as well as representatives of national advocacy and industry 

organizations with whom we spoke, identified numerous obstacles that 

impede effective coordination. We clustered the wide range of identified 

obstacles into three categories related to (1) sharing vehicles and the low 

priority given to funding coordination activities; (2) programmatic 

differences; and (3) limited federal, state, and local leadership and 

commitment to undertake and sustain coordination efforts. To mitigate 

these obstacles, these officials and other experts suggested three potential 

options: harmonizing standards and requirements among federal programs 

with a transportation component, providing and disseminating additional 

guidance and information on coordination, and providing financial 

incentives or mandates to coordinate. 

One set of obstacles was related to officials’ reluctance to share vehicles 

or their tendency to give low priority to funding coordination activities. In 

addition, some areas have limited transportation services available, thus 

limiting any opportunities to benefit from coordination. 

In interviews in every state we visited, as well as with national advocacy 

and industry organizations, the unwillingness or inability to share vehicles 

was identified as a major obstacle. Administrators of some federal 

programs may be apprehensive about sharing vehicles for coordination 

due, in part, to their belief that only they understand their clients’ needs 

and can provide the necessary personalized services. For example, 

program administrators reported being concerned about a loss of control 

over the quality and convenience of transportation services for their 

clients and wanted to maintain their discretion over how to serve their 

clients and which transportation resources to purchase. Program 

administrators also expressed concern over mixing vulnerable 

populations, such as the developmentally disabled and children, or frail, 

sick, and healthy populations, in one coordinated system. According to a 

report on coordinated transportation systems, this reluctance among 

providers to cooperate can lead to an underutilization of vehicles.38

 38Moss Adams, LLP, Community Transportation Association of America, The Coordination 

Challenge (Seattle, WA: June 2000). 

Officials Cited 

Numerous Obstacles 

to Successfully 

Coordinating Services 

and Provided 

Potential Options to 

Mitigate Them 

Officials May Be Reluctant 

to Share Vehicles and 

Provide Financial 

Resources for 

Coordination 

Apprehension about Sharing 

Vehicles 
Page 29 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Likewise, some human service clients may be apprehensive about using 

coordinated transportation because they may be uncomfortable mixing 

with members of other populations with whom they are unfamiliar or they 

may fear a loss of accommodation or convenience, such as having to 

switch from door-to-door service to curb-to-curb service or public transit. 

The overall costs of coordination, which can include additional staff 

members and staff time needed for maintaining and overseeing 

coordination efforts, can be significant. For example, a transportation 

brokerage firm in one state faced substantial added costs when it began 

coordinating transportation for human services programs due to 

requirements to meet more stringent state and federal safety standards. 

However, some officials stated that the low priority given to funding 

coordination activities could impede coordination efforts. For example, 

according to officials in one state, although recipients of funds from DOT’s 

Capital Assistance Program for Elderly Persons and Persons with 

Disabilities are required to coordinate with other local transportation 

services provided from federal sources, the program’s current allotment 

for administrative expenses would not support any staff to work on 

coordination activities. In addition, some states invest in coordination, 

while others do not allocate funds specifically for coordination, and efforts 

to coordinate often become ancillary activities for those involved. 

Guidelines issued by the Coordinating Council state that coordination will 

not solve all transportation problems in all communities.39 Coordination 

may not be an effective strategy in those communities that have limited 

transportation services available, particularly in those communities that 

are not served by public transportation. For example, in some remote 

areas—such as the northwestern part of South Dakota where services 

available to many communities are 40 to 60 miles away—there are few 

transportation services available to transport individuals to hospitals or 

other services. In these areas, coordination may not be a workable or costeffective option. 

 39Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility, Planning Guidelines for Coordinated 

State and Local Specialized Transportation Services (Washington, D.C.: Dec. 20, 2000). 

Low Priority Given to Funding 

Coordination Activities 

Limited Transportation 

Services Available to Realize 

Benefits from Coordination 
Page 30 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Coordinating multiple programs administered at various levels of 

government is complicated because the programs have different 

requirements with respect to eligibility, funding, reporting, and safety; and 

they differ in their programmatic goals and missions. 

Federal program rules that specify the eligible populations that each 

program can serve may limit opportunities for collaboration. For example, 

DOT officials in one region stated that they were unable to combine DOL 

and DOT funds for a DOT transportation program for migrant farm 

workers because DOL funds are designated for U.S. citizens, while there is 

no such restriction on the use of DOT funds. In addition, some liability 

insurance policies specify that a program’s vehicles may serve only a 

certain population, thus those programs face additional insurance costs to 

transport individuals other than program clients. Such restrictions may 

lead to inefficient transportation services within a community. For 

example, an official in one state we visited commented that one agency’s 

vehicle provided medically related trips three times per week to that 

agency’s clients, but would not transport other individuals seeking similar 

medical services provided under other federal programs due, in part, to 

liability insurance restrictions. Safety requirements may also vary by 

program and jurisdiction, thus complicating efforts to transport multiple 

client groups. Some programs, such as Head Start, have specific vehicle 

standards that are often more stringent than those of other programs, 

making it difficult to share vehicles. For instance, different standards for 

roof strength, types of seat belts, and driver qualifications pose problems 

for schools, human service agencies, and public transit providers 

interested in sharing vehicles. Some areas have been able to overcome 

specific program rules to share vehicles. For example, a Head Start 

grantee in one state we visited was able to transport students using 

vehicles supplied by the local public transit provider because these 

vehicles met the same safety standards as school buses. 

Funding streams and cycles vary across federal programs, making 

coordination more difficult. For example, DOT funds generally flow from 

the state to counties or cities, while DOL funds flow through the state to 

local designees. In addition, funding for programs such as Head Start flow 

directly to grantees rather than through states, making it more difficult for 

the states to directly manage the coordination activities of local grantees, 

according to an official in one state. There is also complexity in working 

with different funding time frames and cycles under multiple federal 

programs. For example, although DOT’s JARC program allows grantees to 

use other federal funds to provide the local “match” required to obtain 

Differing Program 

Requirements Can Impede 

Coordination 

Different Eligibility 

Requirements 

Varying Funding Streams and 

Cycles 
Page 31 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

JARC funds, the funding time frames and cycles of these other funding 

sources are different, complicating efforts to combine financial resources. 

Different reporting requirements among programs can create excessive 

paperwork in a coordinated system and may make it difficult for agencies 

to determine their true transportation costs and the benefits that may be 

realized from coordination. For example, one report commented that a 

transit provider was required to give each of several human service 

agencies a separate bill for services provided, which reflected the unique 

requirements imposed by each of those agencies.40 Furthermore, according 

to officials, Medicaid requires the state Medicaid agency to demonstrate 

that individuals receiving transportation under Medicaid are not receiving 

transportation from any other source and that the transportation is 

medically necessary, complicating the determination of how to fund 

transportation services for each Medicaid recipient in a coordinated 

system in which costs are shared among agencies. In addition, human 

service agencies and providers may not be required or accustomed to 

collecting complete and uniform transportation data for their programs. A 

recent report concluded that such information was beneficial because it 

enabled administrators to re-evaluate how best to provide transportation 

services and the savings they could achieve through coordination.41 For 

example, when Florida’s statewide coordination program was established, 

state and local agencies in Florida reported their total estimated annual 

transportation-related expenditures at $8 million. However, once reporting 

requirements were in place for all agencies providing services for the 

transportation-disadvantaged, actual expenditures were estimated to total 

$224.9 million statewide—much higher than the initial estimate. Such 

information has helped agencies in Florida understand the true costs of 

providing transportation and has encouraged some agencies to become 

more interested in coordination as they realize the potential for cost 

savings. 

Unlike transportation agencies, human service agencies provide 

transportation as a secondary service so that their clients may access 

primary human services. Therefore, while DOT-funded transportation 

agencies have specific and relatively uniform federal requirements for 

 40Ecosometrics, Inc., Recommended Framework for Developing State and Local Human 

Services Transportation Planning Guidance (Bethesda, MD: Sept. 22, 1998). 

41Volpe National Transportation Systems Center, Innovative State and Local Planning for 

Coordinated Transportation (U.S. Department of Transportation, February 2002). 

Lack of Uniform Data 

Collection and Reporting 

Requirements among Programs 

Distinct Purposes and Goals 

among Agencies 
Page 32 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

transportation planning, human service agencies do not typically conduct 

transportation planning or collect transportation-related data for their 

programs, making the planning of coordinated transportation between 

transit and human service agencies challenging.42 In addition, human 

service, transportation, medical, and workforce agencies all have distinct 

technical languages and cultures, which may inhibit collaboration among 

these agencies. In one state we visited, the labor and transportation 

departments experienced difficulty collaborating because some common 

terms have completely different meanings within each agency. For 

example, transportation officials interpreted the term “cost-allocation” as 

an accounting methodology to estimate the overall cost of operating 

transportation services in order to determine the appropriate rate to 

charge for these services, while state labor officials interpreted the term as 

a way to determine what proportion of overall costs will be funded by 

each agency. 

Although some federal and state agencies have recognized the potential 

offered by coordination and provided some assistance toward this end, 

officials we interviewed expressed concerns about the amount and 

effectiveness of the guidance they have received on coordination. In 

addition, the absence of interagency forums or other mechanisms to 

develop and share information about coordination initiatives limits the 

support that local providers receive to effectively coordinate. 

Officials in some states we visited said that they receive little federal 

guidance on potential strategies to coordinate services. As a result, they 

develop their own approaches without the benefit of guidance on the most 

effective way to coordinate services. We found the following examples of 

this in our work: 

• Officials in one state said that the guidance on how to share costs among 

programs for projects funded jointly by DOT’s JARC grants, HHS’s TANF 

Program, and DOL’s Welfare-to-Work Program funds did not indicate how 

such sharing could or should be done. Instead, the officials had to seek 

advice from other states. 

 42Volpe National Transportation Systems Center, Innovative State and Local Planning for 

Coordinated Transportation. 

Program Officials May Not 

Know How to Coordinate 

Effectively 

Limited Federal Guidance and 

Information on Coordination 
Page 33 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

• While FTA disseminated coordination guidelines for FTA and HHS 

programs to transportation officials, some HHS and transportation 

officials said these guidelines were not widely disseminated to human 

services officials or programs. 

• According to state Medicaid offices and a national organization of 

individuals and agencies concerned with human services, the Centers for 

Medicare & Medicaid Services have not provided sufficient guidance on 

how to coordinate Medicaid transportation with existing public transit or 

other transportation resources. 

• The Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility has limited visibility for 

agencies actually involved in implementing coordination efforts. In several 

states, human service program administrators with whom we spoke were 

not aware of the Council or its Web site. 

In the five states we visited—even in those states with a coordinating 

body—there was limited state guidance to help local areas implement 

coordination, and some officials stated that the lack of leadership and 

commitment at the state level was a major obstacle to local coordination. 

In addition, while some states have established coordinating councils or 

bodies or have designated a lead agency for coordination, nearly half of 

the states have no coordinating body, according to one report.43 Officials in 

one state explained that the lack of a coordinating body that requires 

various agencies to discuss and resolve transportation issues is the main 

obstacle toward a more coordinated system. 

Even in states with a coordinating council or a lead state agency, there 

may be a lack of local leadership or commitment to coordination efforts. 

For example, one city we visited was unsuccessful in achieving a 

coordinated system despite state encouragement to coordinate and some 

state-provided technical assistance. Stakeholders there described a lack of 

local commitment and leadership in maintaining lines of communication 

among those involved in coordination efforts as a factor leading to the 

failure. In addition, program administrators may not have data on the 

extent of existing transportation services that may be available to their 

clients within a geographic region and, therefore, may fail to realize the 

extent of overlapping and complementary services within their local area. 

Such data can produce improvements. For example, in response to a lack 

 43Westat, Toolkit for Rural Community Coordinated Transportation Services. 

Limited State Guidance and 

Leadership on Coordination 

Limited Local Leadership and 

Commitment to Coordinate 
Page 34 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

of data on local services, an agency in one state we visited took the lead in 

conducting a study that showed the extent to which various agencies 

provide similar transportation services within a geographic region. An 

agency official was hopeful that once other agencies saw the extent of 

overlap, they would be more willing to coordinate. 

Federal, state, and local officials, as well as experts in the area, have 

suggested three potential options to improve coordination of 

transportation services among federal programs: (1) harmonizing 

standards and requirements among federal programs, (2) expanding 

interagency forums and providing and disseminating additional guidance 

and information on coordination, and (3) providing financial incentives or 

coordination mandates. 

Officials and experts expressed a need to harmonize requirements among 

federal programs, such as providing more flexible regulatory language that 

would allow providers to serve additional client groups, creating 

consistent cost accounting methods, and adopting common safety 

standards. For example, one official commented that federal program 

regulations could include language permitting other client groups to make 

use of available transportation options. Also, some officials believed that 

adopting standard accounting procedures among all federal human service 

programs could provide a consistent measure for comparing services, 

allowing administrators to evaluate how best to provide transportation 

services and determine the savings they could achieve through 

coordination. Likewise, making standards for safety (e.g., types of seat 

belts), driver training, and liability insurance provisions uniform among 

federal human service programs, as appropriate, may facilitate the shared 

use of vehicles and drivers in one coordinated system, according to some 

officials. Finally, some officials suggested that federal grant programs that 

allow the use of funds from multiple sources should be under the same 

funding cycle or time frame so that these funds may be combined more 

easily. These officials also commented that harmonizing the time frames 

under which federal funding is allocated could possibly aid collaborative 

planning. However, differing program standards exist to ensure that the 

distinct needs of specific target populations are adequately served and that 

agencies maintain accountability for providing these services. Thus, the 

benefits from any change in standards or requirements would need to be 

balanced against continuing to properly meet client needs and sufficiently 

control funds distributed to grantees. In addition, harmonizing program 

standards and requirements among 62 federal programs authorized by 

more than 20 pieces of legislation would necessitate extensive legislative 

Potential Options to 

Improve Coordination 

Harmonizing Program 

Standards and Requirements 
Page 35 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

changes and could impose additional costs for agencies to meet new 

requirements. 

Some officials advocated expanding the number of agencies involved in 

coordination, establishing interagency forums, and improving central 

clearinghouses as ways to better develop and disseminate guidance on 

coordination. To enhance coordination efforts at the federal level, some 

officials suggested expanding the membership of the Coordinating Council 

on Access and Mobility to include additional federal agencies, so that a 

broader array of agencies that serve the transportation-disadvantaged are 

represented. This could include agencies such as DOL and the Department 

of Education that we identified as being significant because a large 

number of their programs authorize funding of transportation services for 

the transportation-disadvantaged. In addition, establishing state-level 

forums may also facilitate communication among agencies involved in 

coordination and can lead to benefits. For example, one state has 

established an interagency task force on transportation coordination, 

which has resulted in a number of benefits—including the pooling of 

vehicles and the expansion of services—in some areas of the state. Some 

officials and experts suggested that federal agencies provide additional 

guidance and other information that result from forums or other sources 

to clearly define the allowable uses of funds, assist agencies in developing 

cost-sharing arrangements for transporting common clientele, and 

encourage the establishment and participation in interagency forums. This 

additional guidance and information could be better disseminated through 

a central clearinghouse, such as the Coordinating Council’s Web site. 

Some officials and experts believed that incentives or mandates could help 

improve coordination, although others expressed concerns that such 

actions would have negative effects on the ability of local agencies to 

respond to community needs. Officials provided several examples, 

including the following: 

• Federal grant applications could contain provisions giving priority in 

funding to those grantees committed to coordination efforts. 

• With legislative changes, current funds allotted by multiple federal sources 

could be combined into one federal, state, or local fund for transportation 

services for the transportation-disadvantaged. 

• Funding opportunities could be tied to federal or state coordination 

mandates so that there are financial consequences for a failure to 

coordinate. 

Expanding Interagency Forums 

and Providing and 

Disseminating Additional 

Guidance and Information on 

Coordination 

Providing Financial Incentives 

or Mandates 
Page 36 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

However, officials pointed out that these options also had some potential 

downsides that would need to be carefully considered. For example, 

combining funds into a single source could result in some populations 

being unfairly overlooked because smaller agencies at the state or local 

level would be at a disadvantage in competing for funding with larger 

agencies serving more clients. Several officials also raised concerns about 

mandates to coordinate. For example, some officials said that mandates 

might reduce the flexibility of agencies to design and deliver 

transportation services that specifically address their communities’ needs. 

In addition, some officials noted that state efforts or mandates might not 

guarantee successful local coordination. For example, a city in one state 

we visited was unsuccessful in coordinating its multiple transportation 

services despite state encouragement to do so and despite losing some 

federal funding as a result. 

Successful coordination among programs for the transportationdisadvantaged is not a simple matter. One clear need, given the sheer 

number of programs involved, is active and sustained leadership at the 

federal level. While the Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility is 

positioned to supply that leadership, its efforts are constrained in two 

main ways. The first is limited membership: only two departments—DOT 

and HHS—are members. While these departments administer nearly 30 

programs that can be used for transportation, the Departments of 

Education and Labor administer almost as many. The absence of 

Education and Labor lessens the ability to muster a collective effort for 

greater coordination. The second constraint is a limited ability to translate 

a strategic vision into a set of actions. At present, there are no clear links 

between the long-term goals in the Council’s strategic plan and the 

individual tasks in its action plan. Without such links, the Council risks 

judging its progress on the basis of activities undertaken rather than on 

the outcomes of those activities and their contribution toward achieving 

long-term goals. Linking these goals and actions to the strategic and 

annual performance plans of participating departments—because the 

Council relies heavily on support from its member agencies—would 

provide an additional incentive to pursue coordination activities in the 

departments’ activities. 

There is great diversity in the specific suggestions we received about how 

to overcome obstacles to greater coordination. Two of the three main 

options raised by various officials we interviewed—making federal 

program standards more uniform and creating some type of requirement 

or financial incentive for coordination—would require substantial 

Conclusions 
Page 37 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

statutory or regulatory changes and include potential costs. The third 

option, expanding forums and disseminating guidance, can be done in the 

context of existing laws, regulations, and procedures, and may, therefore, 

be the most expeditious starting point. In this regard, clarification from 

federal agencies about how funds can be used for coordination could help 

state and local agencies overcome some of the obstacles identified. 

Similarly, state and local agencies may be in a better position to 

coordinate efforts if they have more knowledge about what has worked 

elsewhere. Although the Council has a Web site with information about 

coordinating transportation services, some state and local officials were 

unaware of it. State and local officials’ point of contact is more likely to be 

the Web site of the department administering the program at the federal 

level. Establishing better links between the Council’s Web site and the 

sites of the departments could help connect grantees with information that 

may help them coordinate with other programs, better serve clients, and 

use funds more efficiently. 

• To increase communication and collaboration among the major agencies 

involved in providing transportation services for the transportationdisadvantaged, we recommend that the Secretaries of the Departments of 

Labor and Education join the Coordinating Council on Access and 

Mobility. 

• To promote and enhance federal, state, and local transportation 

coordination activities, we recommend that the Secretaries of the 

Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, Education, and 

Transportation take the following actions: 

• As member agencies of the Coordinating Council on Access and 

Mobility, ensure that the long-term goals in the Council’s strategic plan 

have clear links to the individual tasks in its action plan and that these 

actions are tied to measurable annual performance goals. 

• Ensure that strategic and annual performance plans discuss their 

departments’ transportation coordination efforts and incorporate longterm goals and performance measures that address the need for 

coordination among programs for the transportation-disadvantaged. 

• Develop and distribute additional guidance to states and other grantees 

that encourages coordinated transportation by clearly defining the 

allowable uses of funds, explaining how to develop cost-sharing 

arrangements for transporting common clientele, and clarifying 

Recommendations 

for Executive Action 
Page 38 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

whether funds can be used to serve individuals other than the 

program’s target population. 

• Link the Web sites of their agencies involved in providing services for 

the transportation-disadvantaged to the Coordinating Council’s Web 

site and advertise the site in agency correspondence and during 

conferences or other outreach opportunities. 

We provided the Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, 

Education, Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and 

Veterans Affairs with draft copies of this report for their review and 

comment. We requested verification of key facts from the Departments of 

Agriculture and the Interior, but we did not seek comments from these 

departments because they did not administer significant numbers of 

programs that benefit the transportation-disadvantaged. 

All six departments generally agreed with the findings and conclusions in 

the report and provided technical clarifications, which were incorporated 

as appropriate. The four departments to whom we made 

recommendations—Health and Human Services, Labor, Education, and 

Transportation—also generally concurred with those recommendations. In 

particular: 

• The Department of Health and Human Services provided written 

comments on the draft of this report which are presented and evaluated in 

appendix V. The department noted that it has initiated actions to 

implement our recommendations, including (1) strengthening the linkage 

between the Coordinating Council’s strategic and action plans, (2) 

reviewing the department-wide strategic plan for opportunities to reflect 

its transportation coordination efforts, (3) developing coordination 

guidance, and (4) linking the Coordinating Council’s Web site to the 

Department of Health and Human Services’ Web site. The department also 

suggested that we consider incorporating other researchers’ estimates of 

transportation spending by health and human service programs. However, 

we estimated program expenditures only for those programs where there 

was sufficient evidence to support an estimate. 

• Department of Labor officials stated that the department looks forward to 

joining the Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility to improve the 

transportation services provided by federal human service programs. In 

addition, department officials commented that the reauthorization of some 

human service and surface transportation legislation was forthcoming 

during the preparation of this report and that these legislative changes 

Agency Comments 

and Our Evaluation 
Page 39 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

may impact the future directions of the federal programs included in this 

report. 

• The Department of Education provided written comments on the draft of 

this report, which are presented in appendix VI. The department said that 

it would look favorably on an opportunity to join the Coordinating Council 

on Access and Mobility and it would consider developing coordination 

guidance for state and other grantees and instituting methods of linking 

Web-based information resources about transportation. 

• Department of Transportation officials said that the Federal Transit 

Administration is committed to accomplishing effective transportation 

coordination and noted that the list of the agency’s activities and 

accomplishments in appendix III of this report demonstrate its 

commitment and support for coordination. It also stated that the 

administration’s proposal for the reauthorization of surface transportation 

legislation, introduced in May 2003, includes provisions that would 

encourage further coordination efforts. 

We are sending copies of this report to the appropriate congressional 

committees and to the Secretaries and other appropriate officials of the 

Departments of Transportation, Health and Human Services, Labor, 

Education, Housing and Urban Development, Veterans Affairs, 

Agriculture, and the Interior. We also will make copies available to others 

upon request. In addition, the report will be available at no charge on the 

GAO Web site at http://www.gao.gov.

If you have any questions about this report, please contact me at 

siggerudk@gao.gov or at (202) 512-2834. Additional GAO contacts and 

acknowledgments are listed in appendix VII. 

Katherine Siggerud 

Acting Director 

Physical Infrastructure Issues 
Appendix I: Scope and Methodology 

Page 40 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Our scope of work included federal programs that provide transportation 

services to the transportation-disadvantaged. To provide information on 

the purposes and types of such federal programs, we first determined the 

universe of programs by reviewing an existing inventory produced by the 

Community Transportation Association of America1

 and a report prepared 

for the Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility.2

 We then 

supplemented and modified this inventory of programs on the basis of 

interviews with agency officials and searches of the Catalog of Federal 

Domestic Assistance. We included only those programs that provide 

nonemergency, nonmilitary, surface transportation services of any kind, 

targeted to transportation-disadvantaged populations. We interviewed 

program administrators to identify the general target population and the 

types of transportation services and trips that are typically provided under 

each program. 

To address the issues related to program funding, effects of coordination, 

and coordination obstacles and options, we (1) conducted interviews and 

document reviews in the pertinent eight federal agencies that administer 

the 62 federal programs that fund transportation services for the 

transportation-disadvantaged; (2) conducted five case studies in Arizona, 

Florida, New York, South Dakota, and Wisconsin; (3) reviewed the 

literature on the challenges encountered in coordinating services for the 

transportation-disadvantaged; and (4) interviewed industry 

representatives and advocacy groups representing elderly and disabled 

populations. We did not verify spending data or estimates received from 

federal agencies for accuracy. 

At the federal level, we interviewed officials from the headquarters of the 

Federal Transit Administration in the Department of Transportation; the 

Administration on Aging, the Administration for Children and Families, the 

Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, the Health Resources Services 

Administration, the Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, and the Substance 

Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration in the Department of 

Health and Human Services; the Employment and Training Administration 

in the Department of Labor; the Department of Agriculture; the 

Department of Education; the Department of Housing and Urban 

 1

Community Transportation Association of America, Building Mobility Partnerships: 

Opportunities for Federal Investment (Washington, D.C.: March 2002). 

2

Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility, Planning Guidelines for State and Local 

Coordination (Washington, D.C.: Dec. 20, 2000). 

Appendix I: Scope and Methodology 
Appendix I: Scope and Methodology 

Page 41 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Development; the Department of the Interior; and the Department of 

Veterans Affairs. We also interviewed federal officials from the 10 regional 

offices of the Federal Transit Administration and some regional officials in 

the Departments of Health and Human Services and Labor. The federal 

officials we met with included representatives of the Coordinating Council 

on Access and Mobility from the Federal Transit Administration and the 

Department of Health and Human Services. 

In conducting our case studies in the five states, we reviewed 

documentation and interviewed more than 100 officials from state and 

local transportation and human service agencies and service providers, as 

well as consumers of transportation services. We judgmentally chose the 

states to include three states without a state mandate or state coordinating 

body and two states with such conditions. We also chose states on the 

basis of relative concentrations of elderly, disabled, and low-income 

populations, and for some, geographic dispersion. Within each state, we 

spoke with state officials responsible for coordinating transportation 

services for the transportation-disadvantaged and/or overseeing funds 

from the 62 federal programs we identified. We also asked some of these 

state officials for recommendations of local officials and transportation 

providers to interview in a range of urban, suburban, and rural areas and 

coordinated and uncoordinated programs within the state. 

Finally, we interviewed representatives of professional, industry, and 

advocacy organizations that are part of the National Consortium on the 

Coordination of Human Services Transportation, a group that represents a 

broad spectrum of stakeholders involved with coordination of 

transportation for the disadvantaged. We conducted our work from July 

2002 through June 2003 in accordance with generally accepted 

government auditing standards. 
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 42 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Program 

Popular title of 

authorizing 

legislation 

U.S. Code 

provisions 

authorizing 

funds for 

transportation 

Typical uses as 

reported by 

program 

officials 

Types of trips 

as reported 

by program 

officials 

Target 

population as 

defined by 

program 

officialsa

Fiscal year 

2001 federal 

spending on 

transportationb

Department of Agriculture, Food and Nutrition Service

Food Stamp 

Employment and 

Training Program 

Food Stamp Act 

of 1977, as 

amended 

7 U.S.C. § 

2015(d)(4)(I)(i)

(I) 

Reimbursement 

or advanced 

payment for 

gasoline 

expenses or bus 

fare 

To access 

education, 

training, 

employment 

services, and 

employment 

placements 

Low-income 

persons 

between the 

ages of 16 and 

59 

$12,952,956c

Department of Education, Office of Elementary and Secondary Education 

21st-Century 

Community Learning 

Centers 

No Child Left 

Behind Act of 

2001 

20 U.S.C. § 

7173(a)(10) 

Contract for 

service 

To access 

educational 

services 

Students from 

low-income 

families 

$84,600,000 

(estimate)d

Department of Education, Office of Innovation and Improvement 

Voluntary Public 

School Choice 

No Child Left 

Behind Act of 

2001 

20 U.S.C. § 

7225a(a) 

Contract for 

services, 

purchase and 

operate vehicles, 

hire bus drivers 

and 

transportation 

directors, 

purchase bus 

passes, redesign 

transportation 

plans including 

new routing 

systems, offer 

professional 

development for 

bus drivers 

To access 

educational 

services and 

programs 

Students from 

underperforming 

schools who 

choose to 

transfer to 

higher 

performing 

schools 

New program, no 

actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Department of Education, Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services

Assistance for 

Education of All 

Children with 

Disabilities 

Individuals with 

Disabilities 

Education Act 

20 U.S.C. §§ 

1401(a)(22), 

1411(a)(1) 

Purchase and 

operate vehicles, 

contract for 

service 

To access 

educational 

services 

Children with 

disabilities 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Centers for 

Independent Living 

Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998 

29 U.S.C. §§ 

796f-4(b)(3) 

and 705(18)(xi) 

Referral, 

assistance, and 

training in the 

use of public 

transportation 

To access 

program 

services 

Persons with a 

significant 

disability 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 43 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Program 

Popular title of 

authorizing 

legislation 

U.S. Code 

provisions 

authorizing 

funds for 

transportation 

Typical uses as 

reported by 

program 

officials 

Types of trips 

as reported 

by program 

officials 

Target 

population as 

defined by 

program 

officialsa

Fiscal year 

2001 federal 

spending on 

transportationb

Independent Living 

Services for Older 

Individuals Who Are 

Blind 

Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998 

29 U.S.C. § 

796k(e)(5) 

Referral, 

assistance, and 

training in the 

use of public 

transportation 

To access 

program 

services, for 

general trips 

Persons aged 

55 or older 

who have 

significant 

visual 

impairment 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Independent Living 

State Grants 

Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998 

29 U.S.C. §§ 

796e-2(1) and 

705(18)(xi) 

Referral, 

assistance, and 

training in the 

use of public 

transportation 

To access 

program 

services, 

employment 

opportunities 

Persons with a 

significant 

disability 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Supported Employment 

Services for Individuals 

with Most Significant 

Disabilities 

Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998 

29 U.S.C. §§ 

795g and 

705(36) 

Transit subsidies 

for public and 

private 

transportation 

(e.g. bus, taxi, 

and paratransit), 

training in the 

use of public 

transportation 

To access 

employment 

placements, 

employment 

services, and 

vocational 

rehabilitation 

services 

Persons with 

most 

significant 

disabilities 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agencye

Vocational 

Rehabilitation Grants 

Rehabilitation 

Act of 1973, as 

amended 

29 U.S.C. § 

723(a)(8) 

Transit subsidies 

for public and 

private 

transportation 

(e.g. bus, taxi, 

and paratransit), 

training in the 

use of public 

transportation 

To access 

employment 

placements, 

employment 

services, and 

vocational 

rehabilitation 

services 

Persons with 

physical or 

mental 

impairments 

$50,700,000 

(estimate)e

Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families

Child Care and 

Development Fund 

Child Care and 

Development 

Block Grant Act 

of 1990, as 

amended 

42 U.S.C. § 

9858c 

States rarely use 

CCDF funds for 

transportation 

and only under 

very 

restricted 

circumstances 

To access 

child care 

services 

Children from 

low-income 

families 

$0 (estimate)f

Community Services 

Block Grant Programs 

Community 

Opportunities, 

Accountability, 

Training, and 

Educational 

Services Act of 

1998 

42 U.S.C. § 

9904 

Taxi vouchers, 

bus tokens 

General trips Low-income 

persons 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 44 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Program 

Popular title of 

authorizing 

legislation 

U.S. Code 

provisions 

authorizing 

funds for 

transportation 

Typical uses as 

reported by 

program 

officials 

Types of trips 

as reported 

by program 

officials 

Target 

population as 

defined by 

program 

officialsa

Fiscal year 

2001 federal 

spending on 

transportationb

Developmental 

Disabilities Projects of 

National Significance 

Developmental 

Disabilities 

Assistance and 

Bill of Rights Act 

of 2000 

42 U.S.C. §§ 

15002, 

15081(2)(D) 

Transportation 

information, 

feasibility 

studies, planning 

General trips Persons with 

developmental 

disabilities 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agencyg

Head Start Augustus F. 

Hawkins Human 

Services 

Reauthorization 

Act of 1990 

42 USCA § 

9835(a)(3)(C) 

(ii) 

Purchase and 

operate vehicles, 

contract with 

transportation 

providers, 

coordinate with 

local education 

agencies 

To access 

educational 

services 

Children from 

low-income 

families 

$514,500,000 

(estimate)h

Refugee and Entrant 

Assistance 

Discretionary Grants 

Refugee Act of 

1980, as 

amended 

8 U.S.C. §§ 

1522(b)(7)(D), 

1522(c) 

Bus passes To access 

employment 

and 

educational 

services 

Refugees No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Refugee and Entrant 

Assistance State 

Administered Programs 

Refugee Act of 

1980, as 

amended 

8 U.S.C. §§ 

1522(b)(7)(D), 

1522(c) 

Bus passes To access 

employment 

and 

educational 

services 

Refugees No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Refugee and Entrant 

Assistance Targeted 

Assistance 

Refugee Act of 

1980, as 

amended 

8 U.S.C. §§ 

1522(b)(7)(D), 

1522(c) 

Bus passes To access 

employment 

and 

educational 

services 

Refugees No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Refugee and Entrant 

Assistance Voluntary 

Agency Programs 

Refugee Act of 

1980, as 

amended 

8 U.S.C. §§ 

1522(b)(7)(D), 

1522(c) 

Bus passes To access 

employment 

and 

educational 

services 

Refugees No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Social Services Block 

Grants 

Social Security 

Act, as amended 

42 U.S.C. § 

1397a(a)(2)(A) 

Any 

transportationrelated use 

To access 

medical or 

social services 

States 

determine 

what 

categories of 

families and 

children 

$18,459,393 
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 45 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Program 

Popular title of 

authorizing 

legislation 

U.S. Code 

provisions 

authorizing 

funds for 

transportation 

Typical uses as 

reported by 

program 

officials 

Types of trips 

as reported 

by program 

officials 

Target 

population as 

defined by 

program 

officialsa

Fiscal year 

2001 federal 

spending on 

transportationb

State Councils on 

Developmental 

Disabilities and 

Protection and 

Advocacy Systems 

Developmental 

Disabilities 

Assistance and 

Bill of Rights Act 

of 2000 

42 U.S.C. §§ 

15002, 15025 

State Councils 

provide small 

grants and 

contracts to local 

organizations to 

establish 

transportation 

projects or 

collaborate in 

improving 

transportation for 

people with 

disabilities; 

Protection and 

Advocacy 

Systems ensure 

that people with 

disabilities have 

access to public 

transportation as 

required by law 

All or general 

trips 

Persons with 

developmental 

disabilities and 

family 

members 

$786,605 (partial 

outlay)i

Temporary Assistance 

for Needy Families 

Personal 

Responsibility 

and Work 

Opportunity 

Reconciliation 

Act of 1996, as 

amended 

42 U.S.C. §§ 

604(a), (k) 

Any use that is 

reasonably 

calculated to 

accomplish a 

purpose of the 

TANF program 

and the 

allowable 

matching portion 

of JARC grants 

General trips No assistance 

is provided to 

families 

without a minor 

child, but 

states 

determine 

specific 

eligibility 

$160,462,214 

(partial outlay)j

Department of Health and Human Services, Administration on Aging 

Grants for Supportive 

Services and Senior 

Centers 

Older Americans 

Act of 1965, as 

amended 

42 U.S.C. § 

3030d (a)(2) 

Contract for 

services 

To access 

program 

services, 

medical, and 

for general 

trips 

Program is 

targeted to 

persons aged 

60 or over 

$72,496,003 

Program for American 

Indian, Alaskan Native, 

and Native Hawaiian 

Elders 

Older Americans 

Act of 1965, as 

amended 

42 U.S.C. §§ 

3057, 

3030d(a)(2) 

Purchase and 

operate vehicles 

To access 

program 

services, 

medical, and 

for general 

trips 

Program is for 

American 

Indian, 

Alaskan 

Native, and 

Native 

Hawaiian 

elders 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 46 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Program 

Popular title of 

authorizing 

legislation 

U.S. Code 

provisions 

authorizing 

funds for 

transportation 

Typical uses as 

reported by 

program 

officials 

Types of trips 

as reported 

by program 

officials 

Target 

population as 

defined by 

program 

officialsa

Fiscal year 

2001 federal 

spending on 

transportationb

Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services 

Medicaid Social Security 

Act, as amended 

42 U.S.C. §§ 

1396a, 

1396n(e)(1)(A) 

Bus tokens, 

subway passes, 

brokerage 

services 

To access 

health care 

services 

Recipients are 

generally lowincome 

persons, but 

states 

determine 

specific 

eligibility 

$976,200,000 

(estimate)k

State Children’s Health 

Insurance Program 

Medicare, 

Medicaid, and 

SCHIP Benefits 

Improvement 

and Protection 

Act of 2000 

42 U.S.C. §§ 

1397jj(a)(26), 

(27) 

Any 

transportationrelated use 

To access 

health care 

services 

Beneficiaries 

are primarily 

children from 

low-income 

families, but 

states 

determine 

eligibility 

$4,398,089 

Department of Health and Human Services, Health Resources and Services Administration

Community Health 

Centers 

Public Health 

Service Act, as 

amended 

42 U.S.C. § 

254b(b)(1)(A) 

(iv) 

Bus tokens, 

vouchers, 

transportation 

coordinators, and 

drivers 

To access 

health care 

services 

Medically 

underserved 

populations 

$4,200,000 

(estimate)l

Healthy Communities 

Access Program 

Public Health 

Service Act, as 

amended 

42 U.S.C. § 

256(e)(1)(B)(iii)

Improve 

coordination of 

transportation 

To access 

health care 

services 

Uninsured or 

underinsured 

populations 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Healthy Start Initiative Public Health 

Service Act, as 

amended 

42 U.S.C. § 

254c-8(e)(1) 

Bus tokens, taxi 

vouchers, 

reimbursement 

for use of own 

vehicle 

To access 

health care 

services 

Residents of 

areas with 

significant 

perinatal 

health 

disparities 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

HIV Care Formula 

Grants 

Ryan White 

Comprehensive 

AIDS Resources 

Emergency Act 

of 1990 

42 U.S.C. §§ 

300ff-21(a), 

23(a)(2)(B) 

Bus passes, 

tokens, taxis, 

vanpools, vehicle 

purchase by 

providers, 

mileage 

reimbursement 

To access 

health care 

services 

Persons with 

HIV or AIDS 

$19,500,000 

(estimate)m

Maternal and Child 

Services Grants 

Social Security 

Act, as amended 

42 U.S.C. § 

701(a)(1)(A) 

Any 

transportationrelated use 

To access 

health care 

services 

Mothers, 

infants and 

children, 

particularly 

from lowincome 

families 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 47 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Program 

Popular title of 

authorizing 

legislation 

U.S. Code 

provisions 

authorizing 

funds for 

transportation 

Typical uses as 

reported by 

program 

officials 

Types of trips 

as reported 

by program 

officials 

Target 

population as 

defined by 

program 

officialsa

Fiscal year 

2001 federal 

spending on 

transportationb

Rural Health Care, 

Rural Health Network, 

and Small Health Care 

Provider Programs 

Health Centers 

Consolidation 

Act of 1996 

42 U.S.C. § 

254c 

Purchase 

vehicles, bus 

passes 

To access 

health care 

services 

Medically 

underserved 

populations in 

rural areas 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Department of Health and Human Services, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration

Community Mental 

Health Services Block 

Grant 

ADAMHA 

Reorganization 

Act, as amended 

42 U.S.C. § 

300x-1(b)(1) 

Any 

transportationrelated use 

To access 

program 

services 

Adults with 

mental illness 

and children 

with emotional 

disturbance 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Substance Abuse 

Prevention and 

Treatment Block Grant 

ADAMHA 

Reorganization 

Act, as amended 

42 U.S.C. § 

300x-32(b) 

Any 

transportationrelated use 

To access 

program 

services 

Persons with a 

substance 

related 

disorder and/or 

recovering 

from 

substance 

related 

disorder 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Department of Housing and Urban Development, Office of Community Planning and Development 

Community 

Development Block 

Grant 

Housing and 

Community 

Development Act 

of 1974 

42 U.S.C. § 

5305(a)(8) 

Purchase and 

operate vehicles 

General trips Program must 

serve a 

majority of lowincome 

persons 

$6,761,486 

(partial outlay)n

Housing Opportunities 

for Persons with AIDS 

AIDS Housing 

Opportunity Act 

42 U.S.C. § 

12907(a)(3) 

Contract for 

services 

To access 

health care 

and other 

services 

Low-income 

persons with 

HIV or AIDS 

and their 

families 

$190,252 

(partial outlay)o

Supportive Housing 

Program 

McKinney-Vento 

Homeless 

Assistance Act of 

1987, as 

amended 

42 U.S.C. § 

11385 

Bus tokens, taxi 

vouchers, 

purchase and 

operate vehicles 

To access 

supportive 

services 

Homeless 

persons and 

families with 

children 

$14,000,000 

(estimate)p

Department of Housing and Urban Development, Office of Public and Indian Housing 

Revitalization of 

Severely Distressed 

Public Housing 

Housing and 

Community 

Development Act 

of 1992, as 

amended 

42 U.S.C. § 

1437v(l)(3) 

Bus tokens, taxi 

vouchers, 

contract for 

services 

Trips related to 

employment or 

obtaining 

necessary 

supportive 

services 

Residents of 

the severely 

distressed 

housing and 

residents of 

the revitalized 

units 

$700,000 

(estimate)q
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 48 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Program 

Popular title of 

authorizing 

legislation 

U.S. Code 

provisions 

authorizing 

funds for 

transportation 

Typical uses as 

reported by 

program 

officials 

Types of trips 

as reported 

by program 

officials 

Target 

population as 

defined by 

program 

officialsa

Fiscal year 

2001 federal 

spending on 

transportationb

Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs 

Indian Employment 

Assistance 

Adult Indian 

Vocational 

Training Act, as 

amended 

25 U.S.C. § 

309 

Gas vouchers To access 

training 

Native 

American 

persons 

between the 

ages of 18 and 

35 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Indian Employment, 

Training and Related 

Servicesr

Indian 

Employment, 

Training and 

Related Services 

Demonstration 

Act of 1992 

25 U.S.C. § 

3401 

Gas vouchers Employmentrelated Low-income 

Native 

American 

persons 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration 

Job Corps Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998 

29 U.S.C. §§ 

2888(a)(1), 

2890 

Bus tickets To access Job 

Corps sites 

and 

employment 

services 

Low-income 

youth 

$21,612,000 

Migrant and Seasonal 

Farmworkers

Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998 

29 U.S.C. §§ 

2801(46), 

2912(d) 

Mileage 

reimbursement 

To access 

employment 

placements or 

intensive and 

training 

services 

Low-income 

persons and 

their 

dependents 

who are 

primarily 

employed in 

agricultural 

labor that is 

seasonal or 

migratory 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Native American 

Employment and 

Training 

Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998 

29 U.S.C. § 

2911(d)(2) 

Bus tokens, 

transit passes, 

use of tribal 

vehicles and 

grantee staff 

vehicles, mileage 

reimbursement 

for participants 

operating “car 

pool” services 

To access 

employment 

placements, 

employment 

services 

Unemployed 

American 

Indians and 

other persons 

of Native 

American 

descent 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Senior Community 

Service Employment 

Program 

Older Americans 

Act of 1965 

42 U.S.C. § 

3056(c)(6)(A) 

(iv) 

Mileage 

reimbursement, 

reimbursement 

for travel costs, 

and payment for 

cost of 

transportation 

To access 

employment 

placements 

Low-income 

persons aged 

55 or over 

$4,400,000 

(estimate)s
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 49 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Program 

Popular title of 

authorizing 

legislation 

U.S. Code 

provisions 

authorizing 

funds for 

transportation 

Typical uses as 

reported by 

program 

officials 

Types of trips 

as reported 

by program 

officials 

Target 

population as 

defined by 

program 

officialsa

Fiscal year 

2001 federal 

spending on 

transportationb

Trade Adjustment 

Assistance - Workers 

Trade Act of 

1974, as 

amended 

19 U.S.C. § 

2296(b) 

Mileage 

reimbursement, 

transit fares 

To access 

training 

Persons found 

to be impacted 

by foreign 

trade, 

increased 

imports, or 

shift in 

production 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Welfare-to-Work 

Grants to Federally 

Recognized Tribes and 

Alaska Nativest

Personal 

Responsibility 

and Work 

Opportunity 

Reconciliation 

Act of 1996 

42 U.S.C. § 

612(a)(3)(C) 

Any 

transportationrelated use, 

though 

purchasing 

vehicles for 

individuals is not 

allowable 

To access 

employment 

placements, 

employment 

services 

American 

Indians and 

other persons 

of Native 

American 

descent who 

are long-term 

welfare 

recipients or 

are low-income

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Welfare-to-Work 

Grants to States and 

Localitiest

Personal 

Responsibility 

and Work 

Opportunity 

Reconciliation 

Act of 1996 

42 U.S.C. § 

603(a)(5)(C) 

Any 

transportationrelated use, 

though 

purchasing 

vehicles for 

individuals is not 

allowable 

To access 

employment 

placements, 

employment 

services 

Long-term 

welfare 

recipients or 

low-income 

individuals 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Work Incentive Grants Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998, as 

amended 

29 U.S.C. §§ 

2801(46), 

2864(d)(2) 

Encourage 

collaboration with 

transportation 

providers 

To access 

one-stop 

services 

Persons with 

disabilities who 

are eligible for 

employment 

and training 

services 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Workforce Investment 

Act Adult Services 

Program 

Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998, as 

amended 

29 U.S.C. §§ 

2801(46), 

2864(e)(2) 

Mileage 

reimbursement, 

bus tokens, 

vouchers 

To access 

training 

Priority must 

be given to 

people on 

assistance and 

low-income 

individuals 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Workforce Investment 

Act Dislocated Worker 

Program 

Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998, as 

amended 

29 U.S.C. §§ 

2801(46), 

2864(e)(2) 

Transportation 

allowance or 

reimbursement, 

bus/subway 

tokens 

To access 

transition 

assistance in 

order to find or 

qualify for new 

employment 

Includes 

workers who 

have been laid 

off, or have 

received an 

individual 

notice of 

termination, or 

notice that a 

facility will 

close 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 50 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Program 

Popular title of 

authorizing 

legislation 

U.S. Code 

provisions 

authorizing 

funds for 

transportation 

Typical uses as 

reported by 

program 

officials 

Types of trips 

as reported 

by program 

officials 

Target 

population as 

defined by 

program 

officialsa

Fiscal year 

2001 federal 

spending on 

transportationb

Workforce Investment 

Act Youth Activities 

Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998, as 

amended 

29 U.S.C. §§ 

2801(46), 

2854(a)(4) 

Public 

transportation 

To access 

training and 

other support 

services 

Youth with low 

individual or 

family income 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Youth Opportunity 

Grants 

Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998, as 

amended 

29 U.S.C. §§ 

2801(46), 

2914(b) 

Bus tokens To access 

program 

services 

Youth from 

high poverty 

areas, 

empowerment 

zones, or 

enterprise 

communities 

$415,000 

(estimate)u

Department of Labor, Employment Standards Administration 

Black Lung Benefits 

Program 

Black Lung 

Benefits Reform 

Act of 1977 

30 U.S.C. § 

923 

Mileage 

reimbursement, 

transit fares, taxi 

vouchers 

To access 

health services

Disabled coal 

miners 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agencyv

Department of Labor, Veterans Employment and Training Service 

Homeless Veterans’ 

Reintegration Project 

Homeless 

Veterans 

Comprehensive 

Assistance Act of 

2001 

38 USCA §§ 

2011, 2021 

Bus tokens To access 

employment 

services 

Homeless 

veterans 

No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Veterans’ Employment 

Program 

Workforce 

Investment Act of 

1998, as 

amended 

29 U.S.C. §§ 

2801(46), 2913 

Bus tokens, 

minor repairs to 

vehicles 

To access 

employment 

services 

Veterans No actual data or 

estimate 

available from 

the federal 

agency 

Department of Transportation, Federal Transit Administration 

Capital and Training 

Assistance Program for 

Over-the-Road Bus 

Accessibility 

Title 49 

Recodification, 

P.L. 103-272 

49 U.S.C. § 

5310 

To make 

vehicles 

wheelchair 

accessible and 

training required 

by ADA 

General trips Persons with 

disabilities 

$2,877,818 

Capital Assistance 

Program for Elderly 

Persons and Persons 

with Disabilities 

Title 49 

Recodification, 

P.L. 103-272 

49 U.S.C. § 

5310 

Assistance in 

purchasing 

vehicles, contract 

for services 

To serve the 

needs of the 

elderly and 

persons with 

disabilities 

Elderly 

persons and 

persons with 

disabilities 

$174,982,628 
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 51 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Program 

Popular title of 

authorizing 

legislation 

U.S. Code 

provisions 

authorizing 

funds for 

transportation 

Typical uses as 

reported by 

program 

officials 

Types of trips 

as reported 

by program 

officials 

Target 

population as 

defined by 

program 

officialsa

Fiscal year 

2001 federal 

spending on 

transportationb

Capital Investment 

Grants 

Transportation 

Equity Act for the 

21st Century 

49 U.S.C. § 

5309 

Assistance for 

bus and busrelated capital 

projects 

General trips General public, 

although some 

projects are for 

the special 

needs of 

elderly persons 

and persons 

with disabilities 

$17,500,000 

(estimate)w

Job Access and 

Reverse Commute 

Transportation 

Equity Act for the 

21st Century 

49 U.S.C. § 

5309 note 

Expand existing 

public 

transportation or 

initiate new 

service 

To access 

employment 

and related 

services 

Low income 

persons, 

including 

persons with 

disabilities 

$85,009,627 

Nonurbanized Area 

Formula Program 

Title 49 

Recodification, 

P.L. 103-272 

49 U.S.C. § 

5311 

Capital and 

operating 

assistance for 

public 

transportation 

service, including 

paratransit 

services, in 

nonurbanized 

areas 

General trips General public, 

although 

paratransit 

services are 

for the special 

needs of 

persons with 

disabilities 

$0 

(partial 

obligation)x

Urbanized Area 

Formula Program 

Title 49 

Recodification, 

P.L. 103-272, as 

amended 

49 U.S.C. § 

5307 

Capital 

assistance, and 

some operating 

assistance for 

public transit, 

including 

paratransit 

services, in 

urbanized areas 

General trips General public, 

although 

paratransit 

services are 

for the special 

needs of 

persons with 

disabilities 

$36,949,680 

(partial 

obligation)y

Department of Veterans Affairs, Veterans Benefits Administration 

Automobiles and 

Adaptive Equipment for 

Certain Disabled 

Veterans and Members 

of the Armed Forces 

Disabled 

Veterans and 

Servicemen’s 

Automobile 

Assistance Act of 

1970 

38 U.S.C. § 

3902 

Purchase of 

personal 

vehicles, 

modifications of 

vehicles 

General trips Veterans and 

service 

members with 

disabilities 

$33,639,000 

Department of Veterans Affairs, Veterans Health Administration 

VA Homeless 

Providers Grant and 

Per Diem Program 

Homeless 

Veterans 

Comprehensive 

Service 

Programs Act of 

1992 

38 U.S.C. § 

7721 note 

20 vans were 

purchased under 

this program 

General trips Homeless 

veterans 

$565,797 
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 52 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Program 

Popular title of 

authorizing 

legislation 

U.S. Code 

provisions 

authorizing 

funds for 

transportation 

Typical uses as 

reported by 

program 

officials 

Types of trips 

as reported 

by program 

officials 

Target 

population as 

defined by 

program 

officialsa

Fiscal year 

2001 federal 

spending on 

transportationb

Veterans Medical Care 

Benefits 

Veterans’ 

Benefits 

Improvements 

Act of 1994 

38 U.S.C. § 

111 

Mileage 

reimbursement, 

contract for 

service 

To access 

health care 

services 

Veterans with 

disabilities or 

low incomes 

$126,594,591 

Total (reported or 

estimated spending 

on transportation 

services for the 

transportationdisadvantaged) 

 $2,445,453,139 

Sources: GAO analysis of information from the Departments of Agriculture, Education, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, the Interior, Labor, Transportation, and Veterans 

Affairs; the Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility; the Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance; the U.S. Code; the Code of Federal Regulations; and the Community Transportation Association of 

America. 

a

A supplemental source for the target populations was the Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance. 

b

Actual outlays or obligations on transportation are given for programs that track this information. All 

data are outlays, except for the following programs, which are obligations: Capital Investment Grants, 

Urbanized Area Formula Program, Nonurbanized Area Formula Program, Job Access and Reverse 

Commute, Capital and Training Assistance for Over-the-Road Bus Accessibility, Capital Assistance 

Program for Elderly Persons and Persons with Disabilities, Automobiles and Adaptive Equipment for 

Certain Disabled Veterans and Members of the Armed Forces, and Veterans Medical Care Benefits. 

Actual data and estimates are the total for the program, unless otherwise noted as partial outlays or 

obligations in the table. When actual information was not available, estimates are given based on 

information provided by program officials or the officials agreed with an estimate made by another 

source. 

c

According to a program official, outlays for the Food Stamp Employment and Training Program have 

increased due to changes in the program from the 2002 Farm Bill. The 2002 Farm Bill eliminates the 

$25 per month cap that the Department of Agriculture will reimburse the states for transportation and 

other work costs incurred by participants. In fiscal year 2002, federal outlays for transportation were 

$18,523,535. 

d

A program official said that 10 percent of total program outlays would be a conservative estimate of 

transportation outlays. 

e

Grantees report total expenditures and unliquidated obligations made by the state Vocational 

Rehabilitation (VR) Agency for transportation services provided to individuals served under the State 

VR Services Program for a fiscal year. Total obligations include both federal and nonfederal funds 

under the State VR Services Program, the supplemental federal funds awarded to the State VR 

Agency for the cost of supported employment services under the Supported Employment Program, 

and funds from other rehabilitation sources. The Department of Education does not collect data on 

the specific sources of funds used for transportation obligations under the program. However, based 

on information available from total annual obligations on a national aggregate basis, a program official 

estimated that of the total amount reported for transportation, about 96 percent would be from the 

State VR Services Program, and of that amount approximately 76 percent would be federal funds. 

Similar estimates could not be made for the Supported Employment Program. 

f

A program official said that, while transportation is an allowable use of funds, using funds for 

transportation is not encouraged. Program officials estimate that transportation expenditures are zero 

or close to zero for this program. 

g

Fiscal year 2001 data are not available because transportation was not an area of emphasis until 

fiscal year 2002. The preliminary fiscal year 2002 outlays for transportation projects totaled 

$1,084,798. 

h

A program official estimated that transportation outlays were 8.3 percent of total outlays. 
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 53 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

i

This is a partial outlay based on voluntary reporting by grantees. Full outlays are not available 

because, according to a program official, grantees were not required to report transportation outlays 

prior to fiscal year 2002. Fiscal year 2002 data are incomplete, however preliminary data on 

transportation outlays from 46 of the 51 grantees totaled $2,215,498. 

j

This is a partial outlay based on the amount grantees reported as non-assistance outlays in a 

category exclusively for transportation. States reported an additional $356.5 million as outlays on 

assistance in a category that includes transportation and supportive services, however program 

officials were unable to determine what percentage of the outlays on assistance were spent on 

transportation. 

k

Program officials indicate that federal data on nonemergency medical transportation are not 

available. Estimate assumes that transportation outlays are 0.73 percent of total program outlays, 

based on previous research, including a survey of state Medicaid programs. 

l

According to a program official, grantees report total outlays for transportation and it is not possible to 

distinguish between federal and nonfederal funds. The official said 22 percent of total transportation 

outlays would be a good estimate of the federal portion of fiscal year 2001 transportation outlays. 

m

Estimate of transportation outlays is based on data from grantee’s budget allocations, as suggested 

by an agency official. 

n

This is a partial outlay for transportation through the Community Development Block Grant program. 

This figure includes transportation outlays for the Entitlement program, but excludes the State 

Administered program. 

o

This is a partial estimate because, according to a program official, data on transportation outlays are 

not available from all grantees. The program official could not provide an estimate of outlays for 

transportation for all grantees. 

p

HUD provided data for transportation spending by 3,187 grantees in fiscal year 2001 that totaled 

$7,221,569. According to HUD program officials, there are a total of 6,323 grantees, about twice as 

many as reported data. The officials therefore estimated that about $14,000,000 would have been 

spent on transportation from all grantees in fiscal year 2001. 

q

Estimate of outlays for transportation is based on a program official’s review of the budgets from 15 

grantees who renewed their grants in fiscal year 2001. The official projected total transportation 

outlays for the program based on these 15 grantees. 

r

Public Law 102-477 is applied to allow tribal governments to consolidate funding from several federal 

programs. These include: the Department of Health and Human Services’s Temporary Assistance for 

Needy Families, and Child Care and Development Fund programs; the Department of Labor’s Native 

American Employment and Training, and Welfare-to-Work Grants for Federally Recognized Tribes 

programs; and the Bureau of Indian Affairs’ Employment Assistance, Indian Social Service and 

Welfare Assistance, Adult Basic Education, and Higher Education programs. The Indian Social 

Services and Welfare Assistance Program is not used for transportation outside 102-477. The Adult 

Basic Education and Higher Education programs do not target transportation-disadvantaged 

populations as defined in this study outside of 102-477. The Employment Assistance program and the 

HHS and DOL programs provide transportation assistance separately from 102-477. 

s

A program official estimated that transportation outlays were approximately 1 percent of total 

program outlays. 

t

Program funding from fiscal year 1998 and 1999 may still be spent, but the program no longer 

receives funding. 

u

Estimate of transportation outlays is based on a program official’s review of grantee obligations. 

v

According to a program official, fiscal year 2001 data are not available due to changes in the 

program’s reporting system. The official reported that transportation outlays for fiscal year 2002 

totaled $478,408. 
Appendix II: Inventory of Federal Programs 

Providing Transportation Services to the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged 

Page 54 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

w

According to a program official, there are three distinct allocations of funds under the Capital 

Investment Grants: the New Starts allocation, which funds new rail projects; the fixed-guideway 

modernization allocation, which provides funding to maintain and update aging rail systems; and the 

bus allocation, which provides funding for the purchase of buses, bus-related equipment and 

paratransit vehicles, and for the construction of bus-related facilities. Because the Capital Investment 

Grants fund projects that provide services for the general public, the transportation-disadvantaged 

likely benefit from many projects funded through each of the three allocations, but information was not 

available to estimate what portion of these funds for the general public benefit the transportationdisadvantaged. However, the program official said that the bus allocation would likely provide the 

most direct benefit for the transportation-disadvantaged and the obligation level could be estimated 

by totaling allocations to purchase vans, buses for the elderly or disabled, or paratransit vehicles and 

equipment. 

x

The Nonurbanized Area Formula Program funds projects that provide services for the general public, 

however grantees can use up to 10 percent of their funds to provide complementary ADA paratransit 

services. Although grantees did not report obligations for complementary ADA paratransit, a program 

official said that transportation-disadvantaged populations might benefit from other services provided 

through this grant, such as demand-responsive services. However, the program official could not 

identify the amount of spending that directly benefits the transportation-disadvantaged. 

y

According to a program official, the Urbanized Area Formula Program funds projects that provide 

services for the general public, however grantees can use up to 10 percent of their funds to provide 

complementary ADA paratransit services. The figure listed in the table is the total obligations that 

grantees reported for providing complementary ADA paratransit services. Although grantees may 

benefit from other services provided through this grant, such as demand-responsive services, the 

amount spent on complementary ADA paratransit is the only portion that program officials could 

identify as directly benefiting the transportation-disadvantaged. 
Appendix III: Federal and State Coordination 

Efforts 

Page 55 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Federal and state efforts to coordinate the services for the transportationdisadvantaged provided through their programs vary widely. This 

appendix offers some examples of those efforts. 

In 1999, we reviewed the coordination efforts of the Coordinating Council 

on Access and Mobility, a body of representatives from the U.S. 

Department of Transportation (DOT) and the U.S. Department of Health 

and Human Services (HHS).1

 We made several recommendations for 

improving coordination between these two agencies. Table 5 shows the 

recommendations and actions taken in response. 

Table 5: Federal Actions Taken in Response to GAO Recommendations for Improving Coordination 

Recommendations from 1999 GAO 

report 

Specific actions completed or products 

issued in response Actions in progress and further concerns 

The DOT/ HHS Coordinating Council 

on Access and Mobility should adopt a 

prioritized strategic plan. 

In August 2000, the Coordinating Council 

adopted a prioritized strategic plan for fiscal 

years 2000 to 2004 and distributed the plan 

to its members. 

The plan has not been updated or distributed 

widely because the Council is now focused 

on a more “product-oriented” approach. The 

plan will be updated at the end of 2003. 

The entire Coordinating Council has not met 

formally since December 2000, but specific 

workgroups have been developing action 

agendas and interagency agreements. 

The Coordinating Council should 

develop an action plan with specific 

responsibilities. 

The Council developed and issued an 

action plan in fiscal year 2003 and a 

number of actions have been completed, 

such as producing a series of “how to” 

publications on using intelligent 

transportation systems to assist in the 

coordination of HHS programs with local 

transit agencies. 

Other actions were not completed by the 

expected date, such as the preparation of a 

promotional brochure on state Medicaid 

brokerage initiatives. Also, the outcome of 

actions is unknown due to the lack of an 

annual report. 

The Coordinating Council should issue 

an annual report on its major initiatives 

and accomplishments to the 

Secretaries of DOT and HHS. 

No annual report has yet been issued. The Council plans to issue its first annual 

report in June 2003. 

 1

U.S. General Accounting Office, Transportation Coordination: Benefits and Barriers 

Exist, and Planning Efforts Progress Slowly, GAO/RCED-00-1 (Oct. 22, 1999). 

Appendix III: Federal and State Coordination 

Efforts 

Federal Coordination 
Appendix III: Federal and State Coordination 

Efforts 

Page 56 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Recommendations from 1999 GAO 

report 

Specific actions completed or products 

issued in response Actions in progress and further concerns 

DOT and HHS should ensure that 

planned coordination efforts reinforce 

one another. 

The document “Planning Guidelines for 

Coordinated State and Local Specialized 

Transportation Services” was issued by the 

Council in December 2000 and distributed 

to state and local transit agencies. The 

guidelines are also available on the Web 

sites of the Council and DOT’s Federal 

Transit Administration (FTA). These 

guidelines provide information to facilitate 

the coordination of transportation services 

for 12 HHS and 10 DOT programs. 

Distribution to health and human service 

providers may not have been as thorough. 

According to some regional FTA and HHS 

officials we interviewed, the guidelines might 

have more impact if they are delivered to 

human service agencies and providers. Other 

officials mentioned the need for more specific 

guidance, such as models for cost sharing. 

DOT and HHS should direct their 

regional working groups to assess 

obstacles to transportation 

coordination. 

The Council’s strategic plan provides for 

regional coordination action plans, including 

the identification and assessment of 

obstacles to transportation coordination. 

All 10 of the regions produced action plans, 

but most have not been updated since fiscal 

year 2000. In addition, the outcomes of 

actions are not routinely tracked. 

The FTA and HHS regional offices are jointly 

sponsoring conferences in spring 2003 for 

state transportation and human service 

officials to, among other things, identify 

obstacles to coordination and best practices 

in successfully overcoming them. 

The Coordinating Council should 

strengthen its Web site and make 

information available on obstacles to 

coordination and strategies to 

overcome them. 

The Council’s official Web site was 

discontinued due to lack of funding, but 

another site was established in May 2002, 

operated by FTA in conjunction with the 

Community Transportation Association of 

America. The site is linked to FTA’s Web 

site. (www.fta.gov/CCAM/www.index.html) 

The Coordinating Council’s Web site is not 

yet linked to HHS’s Web site. 

The Council’s Web site does not contain an 

explicit list of obstacles to coordination or 

strategies to overcome them, but it does 

contain links to several reports that address 

these issues. 

Source: GAO. 

As a result of items in the Coordinating Council’s strategic plan and action 

plan, FTA and HHS have undertaken multiple efforts to coordinate 

transportation services provided through their programs. Other federal 

agencies are also involved in coordination activities. Examples of federal 

coordination efforts include the following: 

• The FTA and HHS’s Administration on Aging have entered into a 

memorandum of understanding to increase coordination of transportation 

for older adults. For example, the agreement says that FTA and the 

Administration on Aging will work together to better coordinate the 

provision of funding opportunities to the aging services and transportation 

networks for the purpose of fostering coordination of transportation 

services and developing innovative service delivery models. 

• FTA and HHS’s Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services are developing 

an action plan between them to address the coordination of Medicaid 

funded transportation. 
Appendix III: Federal and State Coordination 

Efforts 

Page 57 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

• Department of Labor (DOL) and DOT officials are developing guidelines 

about using Workforce Investment Act2

 funds for programs funded under 

DOT’s Job Access and Reverse Commute Program. 

• Some federal regional offices have interagency working groups to discuss 

transportation and other areas of mutual concern. Four of the 10 regions 

have formal working groups that meet regularly to discuss ways to use 

federal funds more efficiently, including for transportation services. These 

groups include officials from FTA, HHS and, in some regions, the 

Departments of Labor, Education, Housing and Urban Development, 

Veterans Affairs, and others. In 4 other regions, FTA and some 

components of HHS work together informally. One of the regions also has 

a formal working group that meets quarterly to discuss Workforce 

Investment Act programs. 

• A study undertaken on behalf of DOT and HHS examined seven specific 

planning strategies that can be used as part of a flexible regional planning 

process for coordinating transportation services of health and human 

service and transit agencies. The report is available on the Coordinating 

Council’s Web site.3

• The Community Transportation Association of America (CTAA) is an 

organization consisting primarily of rural and small community 

transportation providers, and it serves the dual role of transportation 

industry representative and mobility advocate. It also has responsibility for 

updating and maintaining the Coordinating Council’s Web site. CTAA 

sponsored a National Summit on Coordination in May 2003 to encourage 

federal, state, and local coordination. The participants—who came from 

federal departments, human service agencies, state associations, and 

transit providers—discussed, among other things, obstacles to 

coordination and strategies for addressing them. 

• CTAA established a Web site for the National Transit Resource Center, an 

information clearinghouse funded by DOT and HHS.4

 The site contains 

links to the Coordinating Council as well as to the Community 

Transportation Assistance Project (CTAP) and the Rural Transit 

 2

P.L. 105-220. 

3

Volpe National Transportation Systems Center, Innovative State and Local Planning for 

Coordinated Transportation, (U.S. Department of Transportation, February 2002). 

4

http://www.ctaa.org/ntrc.
Appendix III: Federal and State Coordination 

Efforts 

Page 58 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Assistance Program (RTAP). CTAP, funded by HHS, provides information 

about transportation issues, such as accessibility, coordination, funding 

opportunities, training, management, and legislation and regulations. 

CTAP also compiled a comprehensive list of federal funding resources for 

community transportation providers. The purpose of RTAP, funded by 

FTA, is to provide training and technical assistance for rural public 

transportation operators, improve professionalism and safety of rural 

public transit services, promote efficiency and effectiveness of rural 

transit services, and support coordination with human service 

transportation. 

• HHS and CTAA have developed and distributed an Employment 

Transportation Toolkit designed to help communities improve access to 

transportation for employment purposes. 

• DOL is working with CTAA and DOT to implement several rounds of pilot 

projects testing various transportation strategies in support of local onestop employment and training centers.5

 According to DOL officials, these 

strategies can include referral services, transportation information, 

transportation services coordination, mobility management, and other 

transportation strategies. 

• DOL also provides funding to CTAA to convene regional workshops 

among workforce development, human services, transportation, and 

business communities, and to update a technical assistance toolkit for 

employment transportation. The toolkit includes promising practices from 

the state and local levels, as well as information on how businesses can be 

employment transportation partners. 

• According to agency officials, DOL’s Employment and Training 

Administration sponsored a “Promising Practices” project that includes 

transportation coordination efforts. 

• The National Consortium on the Coordination of Human Services 

Transportation—an initiative of FTA and HHS, under the direction of 

CTAA—plans to design and conduct a survey of state Medicaid directors 

to compile data on the Medicaid transit pass program, brokerages, and 

other transportation funding mechanisms within Medicaid; develop a new 

 5

In an effort to coordinate service delivery for employment and training programs, the 

Workforce Investment Act established one-stop centers in all states. Individuals seeking 

employment opportunities and training can receive services from more than a dozen 

federal programs that are required to offer their services through these one-stop centers. 
Appendix III: Federal and State Coordination 

Efforts 

Page 59 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

brochure outlining the benefits of the Medicaid pass program; develop 

case studies of successful brokerage programs and design a brochure 

describing them; identify promising practices and obstacles in human 

service transportation coordination and develop strategies for addressing 

these obstacles; and provide outreach on coordination efforts and 

resources.6

• The federally-funded Transportation Research Board, an arm of the 

National Academy of Sciences, has several completed and ongoing 

projects on transportation coordination, including the following: 

• In June 2000 the board issued “Welfare-to-Work: Integration and 

Coordination of Transportation and Social Services.” This report 

identifies obstacles former welfare recipients face in making the 

transition to work and suggests practical strategies to improve access 

to job opportunities. 

• A draft report of TCRP Project B-24, “Toolkit for Rural Community 

Coordinated Transportation Services,” is expected in June 2003. The 

objective of this research is to develop a practical toolkit for use by 

local communities, state agencies, and tribal governments in planning 

and implementing coordinated community transportation services in 

rural areas. 

• The final report of TCRP Project H-26, “Economic Benefits of 

Coordinating Human Service Transportation and Transit Services,” is 

expected in late 2003. The executive summary has been made available 

for distribution. In this project, the researchers are examining the 

economic benefits associated with various strategies and practices for 

coordinating health and human services and transit providers, as well 

as additional benefits (beyond costs) that might be obtained through 

further coordination efforts. 

• TCRP Project H-30, “Strategies to Increase Coordination of 

Transportation Services for the Transportation Disadvantaged,” has an 

 6

To date, the consortium consists of the AARP, Amalgamated Transit Union, American 

Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, American Public Transportation 

Association, American Public Human Services Association, American Public Works 

Association, American Red Cross, Association of Metropolitan Planning Organizations, 

Children’s Health Fund, Community Transportation Association of America, Easter Seals 

Project Action, National Association of Area Agencies on Aging, National Conference of 

State Legislatures, National Governor’s Association, and the Taxicab, Limousine, and 

Paratransit Association. 
Appendix III: Federal and State Coordination 

Efforts 

Page 60 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

expected completion date of January 2004. The objective of this 

research project is to develop strategies for initiating or improving 

coordination of local and regional publicly funded transportation 

services for the transportation-disadvantaged. 

Coordination of transportation services at the state level varies. We visited 

two states with formal coordinating bodies, one state with a formal 

arrangement between two agencies, and two states with no formal 

coordination. Table 6 identifies the states’ coordination arrangements and 

the agencies involved in formal coordination efforts. 

Table 6: Examples of State Coordination of Services for the Transportation-Disadvantaged 

State Type of coordination 

Statewide 

coordinating body 

Departments/ organizations involved in formal 

coordination 

Arizona None None None 

Florida State-administered 

brokerage system 

Commission for the 

Transportation 

Disadvantaged 

• Departments of Transportation, Education, Veterans Affairs, 

Children and Families, Elder Affairs, Labor and Employment 

Security 

• Agency for Health Care Administration 

• Florida Transit Association 

• Community Transportation Coordinators 

• Transportation operators 

• Nontransportation business community 

• Florida Association for Community Action 

• Early Childhood Council 

• Representatives for the disabled, elderly, rural, and urban 

populations 

New York None None None 

South Dakota Statewide planning 

body 

Transportation 

Planning and 

Coordinating Task 

Force 

• Departments of Transportation, Human Services, Social 

Services, Labor, and Health 

• Coalition of Citizens with Disabilities 

Wisconsin None for entire state None • Departments of Transportation and Workforce Development 

jointly administer Wisconsin Employment Transportation 

Assistance Program (WETAP) 

Source: GAO. 

• Arizona does not have formal transportation coordination efforts at the 

state level, though some state agencies work together informally, and 

some localities have similar arrangements. For example, an official from 

the Jobs Administration in the Department of Economic Security said that 

the Administration works with the Department of Transportation to try to 

avoid duplication of services in rural areas. 

• Florida has a state coordinating body that oversees local coordination 

efforts among most programs. This body is called the Commission for the 

Transportation-Disadvantaged and was created in 1989 by the Florida 

State Coordination 
Appendix III: Federal and State Coordination 

Efforts 

Page 61 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Legislature to oversee the implementation of coordinated transportation 

disadvantaged services. The commission appoints local Community 

Transportation Coordinators who are responsible for the arrangement or 

delivery of transportation services for transportation-disadvantaged 

persons, either by brokering services or by providing transportation 

directly. Agencies are required to purchase transportation through the 

coordinated system, unless the services offered do not meet the needs of 

the client or the agency can find a lower cost alternative that meets the 

same safety standards. 

• New York does not have a formal coordinating body, but some state 

agencies work together informally and many local agencies have entered 

into brokerage agreements. Officials from the Departments of Labor and 

Transportation say they have been working together to identify needs and 

initiate transportation projects for employment programs. In addition, five 

state agencies review and comment on applications for FTA’s Transit 

Capital Assistance Program for Elderly Persons and Persons with 

Disabilities. 

• South Dakota has a state coordination task force that provides guidance to 

local coordination efforts, but not all localities or programs have 

developed coordinated systems. South Dakota established its 

Transportation Planning and Coordinating Task Force in 1998 at the 

initiative of the governor’s office. Additionally, the Departments of Human 

Services and Transportation require all of their programs or applicants to 

coordinate with other resources in the community. 

• Wisconsin does not have a single body in state government that 

coordinates all of Wisconsin’s services for the transportationdisadvantaged, but some state and local programs do coordinate. The state 

Departments of Transportation and Workforce Development jointly 

administer the Wisconsin Employment Transportation Assistance Program 

(WETAP), which uses a combination of federal, state, and local funds to 

provide transportation for low-income residents to get to jobs and 

employment services. WETAP applicants are required to demonstrate 

coordination, and only one grant application is accepted per county. Other 

agencies are also working to improve coordination. The Departments of 

Transportation and Health and Family Services are trying to coordinate 

Medicaid transportation. In addition, the Department of Health and Family 

Services convened a conference in August 2002 to discuss ways to 

improve coordination of transportation for people with disabilities. 
Appendix IV: Informational Resources on 

Coordination 

Page 62 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility, 

www.fta.dot.gov/CCAM/www.index.html 

Community Transportation Association of America, www.ctaa.org 

Workforce Investment Act Transportation Resources, 

www.doleta.gov/usworkforce/resources/transport.asp 

Community Transportation Association of America. 2002. Building 

Mobility Partnerships: Opportunities for Federal Investment. 

Washington, D.C.: Community Transportation Association of America. 

Coordinating Council on Access and Mobility. 2000. Planning Guidelines 

for State and Local Coordination. Washington, D.C.: Coordinating Council 

on Access and Mobility. 

Creative Action, Inc. 2001. Coordinating Transportation Services: Local 

Collaboration and Decision-Making. Prepared for Project Action. Akron, 

OH: Creative Action, Inc. 

National Governor’s Association. 2002. Improving Public Transportation 

Services through Effective Statewide Coordination. Washington, D.C.: 

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and U.S. Department of 

Transportation. 

Volpe National Transportation Systems Center. 2002. Innovative State and 

Local Planning for Coordinated Transportation. Washington, D.C.: U.S. 

Department of Transportation. 

Westat. Economic Benefits of Coordinating Human Service 

Transportation and Transit Services. Transit Cooperative Research 

Project of the Transportation Research Board. Forthcoming. 

Westat. Toolkit for Rural Community Coordinated Transportation 

Services. Transit Cooperative Research Project of the Transportation 

Research Board. Forthcoming. 

National Transportation Consortium of States, Ecosometrics, Inc., and the 

American Public Works Association for the Coordinating Council on 

Access and Mobility. 2000. Working Together: A Directory of State

Coordination Programs, Policies, and Contacts: 1999-2000. Washington, 

D.C. 

Appendix IV: Informational Resources on 

Coordination 

Web Sites 

Reports 
Appendix V: Comments from the Department 

of Health and Human Services 

Page 63 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Appendix V: Comments from the Department 

of Health and Human Services 

Note: GAO comments 

supplementing those in 

the report text appear at 

the end of this appendix. 
Appendix V: Comments from the Department 

of Health and Human Services 

Page 64 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

See page 7. 
Appendix V: Comments from the Department 

of Health and Human Services 

Page 65 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

See comment 2. 

See comment 1. 
Appendix V: Comments from the 

Department of Health and 

Human Services 

Page 66 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

The following are GAO’s comments on HHS’s letter dated May 30, 2003. 

1. HHS suggested that we consider incorporating other estimates of 

transportation spending by health and human service programs, 

particularly one estimate that assumed transportation spending 

accounted for 5 percent of total program spending. In developing our 

estimate of transportation spending, we only included actual or 

estimated figures for which the agencies could provide supporting 

evidence. For those programs that had actual or estimated spending 

information, on average, about 3 percent of total spending for those 

programs was devoted to transportation. We do not know whether this 

3 percent is an appropriate estimate of transportation spending for 

other programs because grantees are generally not required to report 

transportation spending information to the federal agency 

administering the program. Furthermore, several officials who 

administer programs that had no spending data told us that 

transportation services probably represented less than 1 percent of 

their total program spending. 

2. HHS proposed that we identify the levels, sectors, and affiliations of 

officials and others we interviewed. In all agencies and locations we 

talked with key human service and transportation officials responsible 

for the delivery and coordination of human and transportation 

services. We interviewed more than 100 officials in numerous federal, 

state, and local transportation and human service agencies as well as 

individuals representing service providers, consumers, and 

professional and industry advocacy organizations. In our scope and 

methodology section (see app. I), we generally describe the 

responsibilities and affiliations of those we interviewed. 

GAO Comments 
Appendix VI: Comments from the Department 

of Education 

Page 67 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Appendix VI: Comments from the 

Department of Education 
Appendix VI: Comments from the Department 

of Education 

Page 68 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 
Appendix VII: GAO Contacts 

and Staff Acknowledgments 

Page 69 GAO-03-697 Transportation Coordination 

Katherine Siggerud (202) 512-2834 or siggerudk@gao.gov

Rita A. Grieco (202) 512-2834 or griecor@gao.gov

Randall Williamson (206) 287-4860 or williamsonr@gao.gov 

In addition to the individuals above, Christine Bonham, Bradley Hunt, Bert 

Japikse, Jessica Lucas-Judy, Sara Ann Moessbauer, Hilary Murrish, Ryan 

Petitte, Stanley Stenersen, and Andrew Von Ah made key contributions to 

this report. 

Appendix VII: GAO Contacts and Staff 

Acknowledgments 

GAO Contacts 

Staff 

Acknowledgments 

(542009) 
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